Steve Rogers may have retired from his role as Captain America in Avengers: Endgame, but his legacy lives on through many other characters in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. As the Multiverse Saga plays out, Steve’s memory continues to be a focal point of several unique stories, including that of the upcoming film Captain America: New World Order.
After being turned into Captain America by Dr. Abraham Erskine’s super-soldier serum, Steve inspired the creation of several other super-powered characters in the MCU. Many attempted to recreate the experiments that unleashed the First Avenger, with multiple heroes and villains emerging as a result.
Isaiah Bradley
The Falcon and the Winter Soldier introduced Isaiah Bradley to the MCU, adapting his character from the comic book limited series Truth: Red, White, and Black. Portrayed by Carl Lumbly, Isaiah Bradley is revealed to be a super soldier created in the time after Captain America’s disappearance during World War II.
Bradley, along with many of his brothers-in-arms, was illegally subjected to the same experiments as Steve Rogers, albeit without the same safety precautions. As the only test subject to emerge successfully, Bradley became the government’s weapon during the Cold War, though they would eventually imprison and discard him after he had served his purpose.
The Hulk
Dr. Bruce Banner has become one of the foremost Avengers in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, whose exploits as the Hulk are well-known. The brilliant scientist was accidentally turned into the Hulk in an experiment gone awry involving gamma radiation.
In The Incredible Hulk, it is revealed that the subject of Banner’s experiments was to recreate Dr. Erskine’s super-soldier serum using gamma radiation. This, of course, turned him into a very different kind of superpowered being, and has since created several other Hulk-like monsters, some of which could be featured soon as the MCU inches toward a World War Hulk storyline.
The Leader
Tim Blake Nelson made his first appearance in the MCU in 2008, portraying Dr. Samuel Sterns in The Incredible Hulk. While his character has not been seen since the ending of the film implies that Sterns transformed into the villainous Leader after becoming exposed to the Hulk’s gamma-radiated blood.
Given that the Hulk himself is a product of a failed attempt to recreate the super-soldier serum that transformed Steve Rogers into Captain America, it is therefore also true that the Leader is yet another supervillain created by Rogers’s legacy. The supervillain’s plots have yet to play out, as he is confirmed to return in New World Order, perhaps as the new leader of the mysterious Intelligencia
Abomination
Tim Roth recently made his return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Emil Blonsky, a.k.a. the Abomination, in Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings and She-Hulk: Attorney at Law. The recently reformed villain is known as one of the Hulk’s greatest enemies, who stood against him in an epic fight on the streets of Harlem.
The Incredible Hulk depicts the events leading up to Blonsky’s transformation into the Abomination, as his obsession with defeating the Hulk led him to force Dr. Sterns to experiment on him using Bruce Banner’s blood. Banner’s blood, which had been infected with a failed recreation of Erskine’s super-soldier serum, transformed Blonsy into the monstrous Abomination.
Captain Marvel
Brie Larson made her MCU debut in 2019’s hit film Captain Marvel. The eponymous former Air Force pilot is a product of several power sources, which turned her into a cosmic-powered superhero with more abilities than many of the Avengers combined.
While Carol Danvers had little to do with Captain America before her transformation, it was the same Tesseract that Rogers had lost decades ago that triggered Danvers’s origin as Captain Marvel. It was Howard Stark’s friendship with Steve Rogers that led him to find and experiment on the Tesseract, indirectly triggering a chain of events that would lead to the creation of one of the world’s greatest heroes.
U.S. Agent
Wyatt Russell made his first appearance in the MCU as John Walker in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. The newly-minted U.S. Agent is slated to appear as a member of the Thunderbolts in future years, but he was once fascinated with becoming the new Captain America.
Though he was handed the mantle of Captain America before ever taking the super-soldier serum, Walker was obsessed with living up to the legacy of Steve Rogers. This led him to seek out the last remaining samples of the Power Broker’s super-soldier serum, injecting himself with the substance and thereby becoming a super-soldier himself.
The Flag-Smashers
The Flag-Smashers are a terrorist group led by Karli Morganthau that believes the world was better off during the Blip. The group has dealings with the villainous Power Broker, who supplies them with the necessary equipment to take on world governments, specifically the organization known as the Global Repatriation Council.
During the events of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, several of the Flag-Smashers inject themselves with imitations of Erskine’s super-soldier serum, finding that this version of the concoction is not as stable as the original, running rampant with their new powers. Karli in particular wreaks havoc as a super-soldier until she is eventually stopped by the Power Broker herself.
The Red Guardian
David Harbour’s Alexei Shostakov is introduced during the events of Black Widow. The former Soviet agent has enhanced strength and durability, becoming known as the Red Guardian during the Cold War before being locked away in a Siberian gulag.
Black Widow makes it clear that the Red Guardian was fully intended to be the Soviet’s answer to Captain America. While it isn’t certain that Alexei received a similar serum to that of Steve Rogers, it is implied that, without Captain America, there would be no Red Guardian, leading Alexei to form an unhealthy obsession with his American counterpart.
She-Hulk
Tatiana Maslany’s Jennifer Walters is one of the best new characters in Marvel’s Phase 4, who headlines her Disney+ series in She-Hulk: Attorney at Law. Jennifer is accidentally transformed into She-Hulk after a car accident leads her blood to become contaminated by that of her cousin, Bruce Banner.
Bruce’s blood is famously known for being toxic to most other humans due to its irradiated nature induced by his experiments with the super-soldier serum. Jenn is one of the few able to stably transform after receiving this blood, making her an indirect result of Dr. Erskine’s original experiments to create Captain America.
Man-Thing
The Man-Thing is a brand new addition to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, making his debut in Marvel’s first horror special presentation, Werewolf by Night. While little is yet known about this character’s history in the MCU, the indication that he was once a human known as “Ted” indicates that the films will not take a steep departure from the Man-Thing’s comic book counterpart.
In Marvel Comics, Dr. Ted Sallis was a scientist tasked with a project meant to recreate the serum that turned Steve Rogers into Captain America. After a series of betrayals, Sallis was forced to escape a group of enemy agents with the serum in tow. Unfortunately, he crashed his car into a nearby swamp, with the combined elements of the serum and the swampland turning him into the monstrous Man-Thing. While this history is not yet explored in the MCU, fans can expect a similar story to be used to explain the Man-Thing’s existence in future projects.
