Winter Soldier Co-Creator Ed Brubaker Responds to His Anti-Marvel Comments

Before Marvel Studios turned the Winter Soldier into a household name, writer Ed Brubaker and artist Steve Epting introduced the newly-revived Bucky Barnes in their critically-praised run on Captain America. Sebastian Stan portrays the Winter Soldier in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and he teamed with Anthony Mackie for The Falcon and the Winter Soldier on Disney+. The series picked up after Avengers: Endgame with Falcon and Winter Soldier carrying on the Captain America legacy. Since Brubaker is one of the Winter Soldier’s co-creators, fans were excited to get his take on Falcon and Winter Soldier. However, Brubaker didn’t give Marvel a ringing endorsement, and he’s now expanded on those comments.

Brubaker originally shared he had mixed emotions about Falcon and Winter Soldier. Specifically, he felt creators like himself and Epting weren’t being properly compensated for creating characters like the Winter Soldier in the comics, who are then spun out into billion-dollar film and TV projects years later. This was partly the reason why Brubaker hadn’t watched Falcon and Winter Soldier. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Brubaker said he has finally watched the show, and has held private conversations with Marvel since his earlier statements.

“Yeah, I watched it,” Brubaker told THR. “I’ve had a little bit of contact with the people at Marvel since all that stuff went public. I’d been trying to get in touch with them behind the scenes before I said anything in public. The only reason I said anything in public was because I was getting inundated with people wanting my opinion about this or how do I feel. I just started to feel, ‘Man, I guess I should just be honest about how I feel about it,’ which is, ‘I feel kind of like I got fucked over.’ (Laughs.) Because they didn’t own a movie studio when I wrote that story.”

Brubaker added how he wasn’t angry when discussing his Winter Soldier feelings on the Fatman Beyond podcast with Kevin Smith and Marc Bernardin, even though the written quotes came across that way. “If you listen to the way I’m talking about it [in the podcast], I’m not yelling or upset,” he said. “I know what the situation is and I’m just explaining the situation. But I sound very aggrieved in some of the articles where they are quoting me. I’m like, ‘Well, I was actually laughing when I said that.’ It keeps coming up again and again. Over the last two months, I’ve had people emailing me, ‘Why do you keep talking about this?’ I say, ‘I haven’t said a word about it since the Kevin Smith thing.'”

After Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow lawsuit against Disney, Brubaker said he was once again bombarded with questions. He’s hoping these talks lead to a happy ending between him and Marvel. 

“Until just now I haven’t talked about it to anybody outside of a couple of people inside Marvel,” he said. “I’m hoping that there will be some kind of happy ending to it at this point because I feel like they definitely got the message. (Laughs.)”

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