As with every other movie that involves time travel as a main component of its plot, Avengers: Endgame has been the subject of much debate lately, as fans argue over whether or not its sci-fi logic holds up to scrutiny.
In particular, the logistics of Cap’s ending have been called into question on numerous occasions, as the rules of time travel established in the movie seem to conflict with the fact that we see Old Man Steve sitting by that lake in the original timeline, when his alternate life should’ve really created a new timeline. Making things even more confusing is that the writers and directors have offered up two conflicting explanations for this, meaning we don’t really have a straight answer yet.
And now, it’s only gotten worse. If you’ll recall, in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, we learn that Peggy has two children with the man she married. Well, turns out that man was Steve Rogers and those are indeed his children. At least, that’s according to Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely.
The Endgame writers spoke to THR recently and revealed that they always planned on having Cap be the father and the fact that he is means that, as Markus says, there are now two kids out there who have some super soldier DNA in them.
“It was always our intention that he was the father of those two children. But again, there are time travel loopholes for that,” said McFeely.
Added Markus: “It does introduce the idea that there are two children who have somewhat super soldier DNA.”
Obviously, this causes a lot of issues with the MCU timeline and already, fans are getting frustrated. Over on Reddit, one user wrote:
That breaks the time travel rules established in the movie. And the directors already said Steve lived his life with Peggy in an alternate timeline and then jumped back to the original timeline as an old man. The directors overrule the writers in my opinion. And since the writers’ statements don’t line up with the film, I’m disregarding them. Plus that would mean Steve unknowingly kissed one of his relatives during Civil War. Not a fan of that at all. I’ll stick with the directors’ statements instead. It fits the rules and it makes perfect sense.
Another user, meanwhile, chimed in with the following:
Well the directors say he went to a new timeline with an alternate Peggy. The writers suggest he stayed in the current timeline with the original Peggy. That’s a contradiction so both can’t be true, right? So I’ve just decided to agree with the directors because that fits with the explanations that Bruce and Ancient One give in the movie
Clearly, this latest reveal by Markus and McFeely is only going to cause more confusion around the film’s time travel elements, but regardless of if it all makes sense or not, it’ll be interesting to see how future projects from the studio follow through on the possibilities suggested in Avengers: Endgame.
In particular, it’s believed that Loki’s Disney Plus show will be set in the timeline where he runs off with the Tesseract. And as for the future of Captain America, though Steve looks to have hung up his shield, you can expect Sam Wilson to carry the title in the upcoming Falcon and and Winter Soldier TV series.