Captain America may not have had the most significant role in Avengers: Endgame (it would’ve been hard for anyone to surpass Tony Stark in that department), but he was an instrumental figure throughout the film. And one fan on Reddit has interpreted one of the funnier moments in the movie to mean that Cap accidentally signed on as an agent of Hydra, explaining that this development could tie into the upcoming Loki Disney Plus series.
The scene in question involves Steve Rogers using his knowledge of the future to secure the Tesseract when he goes back in the past. Just as he had been in The Winter Soldier, the hero was stuck in an elevator full of Hydra agents. But instead of getting into an epic, claustrophobic battle, he throws them off guard and out of suspicion by whispering “Hail Hydra.”
This, of course, results in Steve having to fight the 2012 version of himself, who believes that his future self is Thor’s mischievous brother in disguise. Rogers knocks out his outdated double with the staff though and goes on his way.
Now, Reddit user ConstantCompile has theorized that by using the stone to knock out the younger version of Rogers, the hero could have put himself on the road to becoming a double agent in that particular timeline. The idea is that the Hydra agents that future Cap had bumped into on the elevator may’ve found past Cap lying there and taken the mind-scrambled soldier back to headquarters for debriefing. This would leave that Rogers “highly susceptible to influence.”
The user then continues on to say that if Marvel wanted Loki to do a “face turn” in the TV series, they could make this Hydra Captain America the villain of the show.
As the Redditor puts it:
In Endgame, when present-day Cap travels to 2012, he whispers “Hail Hydra” to an elevator full of HYDRA agents before relieving them of the scepter. He then incapacitates 2012 Cap using the scepter. The specifics of the scepter are never explained, but in Avengers 2012, Loki uses the scepter to mind-control Hawkeye into doing his bidding. So now we have 2012 Cap knocked out on the floor, having just been mind-scrambled by the scepter and probably highly susceptible to influence. And who will presumably arrive on the scene after present-day Cap leaves? …The elevator-full of HYDRA agents from earlier.
They could potentially move 2012 Cap to an off-site location where he would be “debriefed.” This is the same timeline where Loki grabs the Tesseract and summarily escapes. If Marvel wanted Loki to do a “face-turn” in his Disney+ series, they could turn 2012 Cap into a villain – essentially adapting the Secret Empire arc. They wouldn’t even need Chris Evans to do it; 2012 Cap could keep his helmet on the entire time, a similar-looking actor could do their best Chris Evans impression, and if his voice or his mannerisms seem slightly “off,” so much the better.
It’s an interesting theory, to be sure, but what do you make of it? Is an evil Captain America possible? And if it were, is it something you’d actually want to see? Be sure to drop us a comment down below and check out the entire Avengers: Endgame theory on Reddit if you think it’d tread water.
