Why did Bucky Barnes ask "What did I do?"

Question

In CA: Civil War, Bucky was triggered using the 10 words by Zemo, after being captured in Bucharest. He fought his way out of the facility, trying to steal a helicopter, until Steve stopped him. Later, he wakes up with his metal arm stuck under some kind of weight, to prevent him from escaping, should he still be in Winter Soldier mode. He proves to Steve that he isn't, by remembering Sarah (Steve's mom) and about Steve wearing newspapers in his shoes.

And then he asks "What did I do?"

Why did he ask that?

Just seconds after he asked what he did, he seemed to remember that Zemo (after triggering the Winter Soldier) wanted to know about Siberia, and about where exactly the Soldier was kept. He remembered what he did, presumably as the Winter Soldier in the Siberia facility years ago.

And later, when he's fighting Tony Stark in that same facility, Tony asks him if he even remembers killing Tony's parents. And Bucky says "I remember all of them."

So he clearly can remember what he does as the Winter Soldier, and only the memories of before he fell from the train were foggy to him.

So why didn't he remember what he did in the Berlin facility after Zemo triggered him?

Answer 1

Bucky took a pretty solid blow to the head when the helicopter crashed before Steve 'captured' him. That could have worked to help him break the brainwashing, sort of the way Hawkeye was able to break from Loki's mind control after a blow to the head in Avengers.

Its worth noting that the most immediate information he recalled about Steve was from before Hydra captured him. It could be that information from before the years of brainwashing, amnesia and cryo freeze comes back easier. We still don't know a lot about how the MCU's Winter Soldier's conditioning worked. It would make sense for Hydra to want to keep his semantic memory intact but eliminate his episodic memory. That way, he would be able to pass on information to his handlers later (such as dates, locations, etc) when needed, but not recall any actual details about what he did, so Hydra's assassinations and other dirty work could never be leaked.

The actor who plays Bucky Barnes has said (at a Comic Con) that his interpretation of the "I remember all of them" line is that the remark was false but Bucky figured that's what Tony wanted to hear so he gave it to him because he just wanted it to be over with and assumed someone was going to die at that point, so he was also ensuring that it would be him. I don't recall him saying anything about discussing that with the writers, but no one has come forward to dispute that idea. Take that as you will.