The Captain America Movies Have Always Been Gay Cinema

In 2025, maybe it’s not surprising to hear that pop culture fans read queer subtext in a TV show or movie. But 10 years ago, it was audacious, particularly when that gayness was applied to one of the biggest (and straightest) franchises in the history of cinema: the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

While there are now many instances of shipping—the phenomenon where fans fantasize about platonic characters becoming romantic—within the MCU, during the franchise’s inception there was little to none. But, with the release of Captain America: The First Avenger back in 2011, a new fandom bloomed and quickly became one of the biggest and most passionate cases of queer shipping this century.

Though both Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) and Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) had previously appeared in various Marvel comics dating to the 1940s, it wasn’t until their first on-screen MCU appearance that fanworks surrounding Steve and Bucky (deemed Stucky by fans) grew in popularity.

“I think their dynamic is totally pivotal in terms of the foundation of the movies,” says Cary, an administrative assistant who lives in Brooklyn. This is mainly due to the way which the series’ various writers and directors reworked their friendship in the films, which abandoned a simple hero-and-sidekick dynamic, instead making the two childhood friends who were separated during WWII, only to reconnect with each other on the battlefield.

“I loved the tragedy of [Steve’s] relationship with Bucky. The films really set [it] up to be the biggest Achilles’ heel in Steve’s life,” says Nadira, a freelance journalist from Manchester.

A robust fandom was quickly born. Bucky’s “death” in the film’s second act provided great angst material for writers to work with. Since then, 59,471 fanworks have been written about the pairing on fanfiction website Archiveofourown.org, with the most popular having over 1 million hits. These works often utilize the ways in which the MCU re-conceptualized the nature of their relationship, presenting the pairing as lifelong best friends separated amongst war and disaster. When Captain America: The Winter Soldier was released in 2014, the fandom truly gained steam.

The Winter Soldier reveals that the film’s titular villain is actually Bucky, who was brainwashed by Russian operatives after he seemingly fell to his death in the previous film. In The Winter Soldier, Bucky is ultimately only able to break out of his brainwashing when Steve tells him that he’s with him “to the end of the line,” something Bucky told him back in the 1940s before the war tore them apart.

“It’s like catnip,” says Nadira. “It’s irresistible storytelling.” From here, the intrigue into this couple became focused on how two men, both out of time, would adjust to the 21st century, while also relearning how to love each other in a modern world where queerness is finally accepted.

The idea of these two closeted men finally being able to love each other is a pivotal aspect of fanworks, and something that would have made a significant impact on fans if Marvel had been brave enough to embrace Steve and Bucky’s chemistry. “As someone who was deep in the closet at the time [...] something about the repression of it all really appealed to me,” says Cary.

If Bucky were gender-swapped as portrayed as a woman, there is no doubt that, after the second film, these two characters would slowly begin to become a couple. I mean, the only thing more romantic than friends-to-lovers is friends-to-lovers-to-enemies-to-lovers, right? Cary, agrees. “I always found the idea of their love for each other transcending literal brainwashing to be the most romantic thing ever.”

It’s the Stucky relationship that is the main reason why Marvel’s golden boy slowly morphed into a vigilante. In each Captain America film, Steve blatantly defies orders to save Bucky, be it disobeying direct instructions from his colonel and saving Bucky from an enemy’s base in WWII or risking his own life to decommission Bucky from decades of brainwashing.

The films have always made it abundantly clear that Steve’s main reason for existing—outside of saving innocents—is his best friend. This isn’t simply subtext, its strict text in these films, says Nadira. “The fact that he couldn’t save Bucky the first time around meant that when given the opportunity, he would stand by Bucky even to the detriment of his other relationships.”

The directors and writers of these films have indirectly supplied queer fans with an abundance of evidence to support the theory that Steve and Bucky may be gay and in love with each other. Chris Evans himself added fuel to the fire by stating multiple times on press tours that the relationship between Steve and Bucky is indeed a love story. Iin May 2016, as the press tour for Captain America: Civil War was underway, the hashtag “#givecaptainamericaaboyfriend” went viral.

Unfortunately, Captain America never did truly get a boyfriend, and the conclusion to Steve and Bucky’s story ended in a way that isn’t surprising for the late 2010s. In Avengers: Endgame, after the two helped save the world from Thanos, Steve strangely decides to leave Bucky in the present while he goes gallivanting back in time, ultimately settling down in the 1940s with his First Avenger love interest Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell). For many fans, it was a slap in the face. To Nadira, it was no surprise. “I knew Marvel would never make their symbol of American patriotism queer in any way,” she says.

But can the MCU, which is releasing the Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) helmed Captain America: Brave New World on Feb, 14, survive without this ship? “I think every future Captain America film [or] show will be haunted by the ghost of Steve and Bucky,” says Nadira. They are undeniably what made this trilogy so successful, and it’s hard to imagine the franchise without their presence—and the presence of the fans who made them one of the most important ships of this last decade. Even now, nearly six years since their last on-screen appearance together, the ship is still pivotal. “I really only see the films discussed these days in the context of Stucky,” says Cary.

While the foundational relationship between the two men was never given the respect or the growth that it deserved, there’s no denying that these films existed as more than superhero fodder for many people. The legacy of these films will always be its queer subtext, intentional or not, and how fans built the success of these films around this underlying sense of love between two men. For Nadira, the Stucky fandom remains a prevalent reminder of what fandom can be, and how it can withstand the test of time. “Every time I see a new fandom grit their teeth and insist on a ship regardless of the writers’ intent, I think fondly of the Stucky warriors. They paved the way.”