Captain America is so pure that he even proved himself worthy enough to lift Thor's hammer in Avengers: Endgame, but controversy still follows him everywhere he goes.
Whether he's secretly defecting to Hydra or becoming the literal butt of Endgame's most "controversial" joke, Steve Rogers hasn't had an easy time of it over the past 80 years, and it turns out that this was particularly true in the '90s.
At the beginning of the decade, Marvel released a Captain America movie so terrible that even Steve himself would have used bad language while watching it, and just a few years later, his one and only animated series was cancelled too.
Produced by Saban Entertainment, Cap's cartoon was storyboarded by a number of popular animators at the time, including Dave Simons, Jo Meugniot and Will Meugniot, who previously worked on Batman: The Animated Series and Saban's own '90s X-Men show.
Impressively, not a single episode made it to air. In fact, the only footage that ever surfaced was this promo which reveals that the story would have been set during Cap's early years in World War II. Check it out below:
We earn a commission for products purchased through some links in this article.
Yes, that was Bucky before his Winter Soldier days and no, the '90s weren't fuzzier than you remember.
Despite the promo's poor quality, it's easy to see how a Captain America show would have fit nicely with other Marvel cartoons that were riding high at the time. So what went wrong?
Well, that's where things actually do become fuzzy.
First off, the show planned to make a couple of big changes to Cap's story. Instead of being called Steve Rogers, the Star-Spangled Avenger would have been known instead as Tommy Tompkins. Steve Rogers would have just been a pseudonym.
As if that weren't strange enough, the show would have also avoided naming the enemy as Nazis, even though that's exactly who they would have been given the time and setting. (Especially weird given that the Captain America comic's very first issue featured Steve punching out Adolf Hitler.)
There have long been rumours that the Captain America cartoon was cancelled precisely because of this, but the truth is more complicated than that.
According to John Semper Jr, a producer on the Spider-Man animated series, Captain America's first and only animated venture was cancelled "due to Marvel's shaky financial and 'political' situation" (as per comicbook.com).
This "political" reference hints that those pesky Nazis and Marvel's reluctance to mention them by name is a big reason why the show was never made, but writer Steve Englehart tells a different story.
On his website, the famed comic-book creator reveals that seven episodes had already been written for the show, including his own called 'Skullhenge'.
While he also mentions that neither Nazis nor swastikas were allowed to be referenced in the series, Englehart says that it was "Marvel's monetary troubles" which led to the show's cancellation. Which is a shame, because watching Red Skull transform Stonehenge into a giant swastika would have been nuts to say the least.
CBR writer Brian Cronin also did some investigating and concluded that a change in management at Marvel and the company's eventual bankruptcy were indeed the most likely culprits behind the show's cancellation.
While Captain America is strong enough to defeat some of the most evil forces in the Marvel universe, it seems that in the end, it was a lack of savings that took the Super Soldier out for good — at least, in animated form.
Given that the show was never even finished, don't expect this cartoon version of America's Ass to join the likes of '90s Spidey and the X-Men on Disney+. Cap's worthy of plenty, but not his own animated show, unfortunately.
Avengers: Endgame is out now on DVD, Blu-ray, 3D, 4K and digital download.
Disney+ Watch the MCU on Disney+
Abrams Books The Story of Marvel Studios: The Making of the Marvel Cinematic Universe by Tara Bennett and Paul Terry
Marvel Studios Marvel Phase 1-3 complete set Blu-ray
![Avengers: Endgame 4K Includes Bonus Disk [Blu-ray] [2019] [Region Free]](https://hips.hearstapps.com/vader-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/1565171628-51DyZnkLD7L.jpg?crop=1xw:1xh;center,top&resize=980:* "Avengers: Endgame 4K Includes Bonus Disk [Blu-ray] [2019] [Region Free]")
Disney/Marvel Studios Avengers: Endgame 4K Includes Bonus Disk [Blu-ray] [2019] [Region Free]
![Avengers: 1-4 Complete Blu-ray Boxset Includes Bonus Disk [2019] [Region Free]](https://hips.hearstapps.com/vader-prod.s3.amazonaws.com/1565171833-51x6a0eLuRL.jpg?crop=1xw:1xh;center,top&resize=980:* "Avengers: 1-4 Complete Blu-ray Boxset Includes Bonus Disk [2019] [Region Free]")
Disney/Marvel Studios Avengers: 1-4 Complete Blu-ray Boxset Includes Bonus Disk [2019] [Region Free]
Want up-to-the-minute entertainment news and features? Just hit 'Like' on our Digital Spy Facebook page and 'Follow' on our @digitalspy Instagram and Twitter account.
After teaching in England and South Korea, David turned to writing in Germany, where he covered everything from superhero movies to the Berlin Film Festival.
In 2019, David moved to London to join Digital Spy, where he could indulge his love of comics, horror and LGBTQ+ storytelling as Deputy TV Editor, and later, as Acting TV Editor.
David has spoken on numerous LGBTQ+ panels to discuss queer representation and in 2020, he created the Rainbow Crew interview series, which celebrates LGBTQ+ talent on both sides of the camera via video content and longform reads.
Beyond that, David has interviewed all your faves, including Henry Cavill, Pedro Pascal, Olivia Colman, Patrick Stewart, Ncuti Gatwa, Jamie Dornan, Regina King, and more — not to mention countless Drag Race legends.
As a freelance entertainment journalist, David has bylines across a range of publications including Empire Online, Radio Times, INTO, Highsnobiety, Den of Geek, The Digital Fix and Sight & Sound.
