Football Counter-Programming 2026: Week 4--Androids, Aliens, and Wizards

If you don't recognize Sebastian Stan's MCU portrayal of Captain America's sidekick/childhood friend from the photo above, Bucky is . . . uh . . . Steve Roger's childhood friend and Captain America sidekick World War II pal. Bucky would be separated from Cap and the other Howling Commandoes in a World War II attack on the Red Skull and was thought to be dead.

But no on in comics stays dead long. So it was later revealed that Barnes did not die. He was found by the Soviets and kept alive (sometimes in suspended animation cold storage, which helps explain his long life) and given a Iron Curtain version of the super soldier serum that transformed Steve into Cap. Thus, a brainwashed Bucky Barnes was transformed into the Winter Soldier--a deadly assassin who helped destabilize global politics during the decades of the Cold War.

The Winter Soldier was captured by Captain America and, with the help of Wakandan allies, deprogrammed. Thus Cap and Bucky became allies and fighting comrades once again. In the MCU, at least, Bucky now helps lead the New Avengers (aka The Thunderbolts). And Steve is dead in a past timeline . . . or secretly living on the Moon according to some MCU in-world conspiracy theorists.

All of that is great. But what is really important for today's FC-P is the fact that James Buchanan "Bucky" Barnes is just a big ole nerd.

This delightful exchange between Bucky and the new Captain America (aka Sam Wilson aka "Falcon") took place after Steve disappeared into a new time stream following the events of Avengers: Endgame. 

What is my point in all this?

Mostly it is to distract you from college football, as you already know.

But it is also a motivating reason to drop this video clip. Because I love the framing that the Avengers almost exclusively fight one of the Big Three. But more than that is the revelation that Bucky was enough of a nerd to get his hands on an original American publication of The Hobbit. My brief research does support his claim.

The book was published in Britain and the United States in 1937, as Bucky says. So he would have had the opportunity to read it when he was twenty years old in 1937. Though born in Indiana, Bucky's family moved to New York City during his childhood. It is there, presumably, when Bucky managed to read an early New York Post review of The Hobbit and was sufficiently intrigued to get his own copy.

We know little more about Bucky's reading habits. As portrayed in the MCU, Bucky's young adult life seems more focused on relationships with young women and keeping a careful eye on Skinny Steve Rogers. But maybe he was a fantasy fan his whole life.

Do you think Bucky got into D & D at some point? Being a brainwashed Commie assassin during the Cold War years of the 1970s and 1980s would made that unlikely. But post Winter Soldier, maybe he made up for lost time and caught up with his old habits before World War II? We know that Steve made an effort to watch Star Wars and Star Trek and do his own bit of pop culture reconnaissance.

I support the notion that Bucky spent time watching movies and reading The Lord of the Rings, watching Peter Jackson's movies, and maybe even getting into Raymond Feist's Magician series. Or Lev Grossman's The Magicians series. (Do you think he was a Ring of Time guy? What about A Song of Ice and Fire?) He had LOTS of deprogramming time on his hands while he was recuperating in Wakanda.

You also may have lots of time this weekend.

I implore you to NOT waste it with college football.

That is all. See you next Saturday!