I know the chest strap is adorable and practical and all but I just want to point out that it’s also a design callback to his (unspeakably hot) gun harness as the Winter Soldier.
His costume design throughout the movies is, frankly, brilliant in how visual echoes of his past resonate into his future. The Winter Soldier leather vest echoes the Howling Commando blue coat…
…in its double-breasting with buttons on both sides, strap across the chest, high neck, plus utility belt.
And his impromptu combat gear in Civil War strongly recalls the first outfit he wore in TWS with “off-the-rack” elements of his on-the-lam civvies…
It’s worth noting here that Judianna Makovsky (who has some amazing credits!) was the costume designer for both TWS and CW, so you can take it to the bank that this is all completely intentional.
Of course, a large portion of the costume design (especially post-TFA) is straight from the comic books, but if you compare Bucky’s Howling Commando costume to the Winter Soldier’s tac gear from the comic books…
You’ll see there is a very slight resemblance but it’s far more subtle than the design echoes in the movies (mostly just the buttons and domino – the latter of which was replaced by the goggles in TWS).
It’s probably too much to hope for that the Winter Soldier tac gear will make a reappearance in Infinity War (fandom often wants Bucky to divorce himself entirely from the Winter Soldier identity, but reality is that in the comics he continued to use that gear and name as a hero, and that’s one of my fondest wishes for him in the MCU), but given Makovsky is the costume designer for that title too, I’m sure whatever he ends up in will be a) strongly reminiscent of his past designs and b) hot as fuck.
I had noticed a lot of this, but this is a great analysis and caught things I didn’t–like that backpack chest strap.
The costuming in WS was amazing for everyone, but I really like how the Winter Soldier’s costume echos Bucky’s–and how that’s played out in all the rest of the movies too.
