Why Captain America Will Actually Be A Skrull in Avengers 4
There’s been an interesting theory going around lately involving Captain America, the Skrulls, and Chris Evans. As most Marvel fans know, Chris Evans has been talking about hanging up his shield for a while now and giving up his role as Captain America, and there doesn’t seem like a better time for him to do it considering the end of the MCU’s first story arc is near with Avengers 4 being on the horizon.
But what happens to his characterization of Steve Rogers if Evans does decide to leave the MCU after this latest Avengers installment? Well, if Infinity War is anything to go off of the most likely scenario is for Steve Rodgers to die before everything is said and done, or more accurately heroically sacrifice himself to save the world and stop the Mad Titan, but what if things didn’t play out that way? What if instead of the real Captain America dying, it was a Skrull in disguise and Steve Rogers got to live in the past with his first love, Peggy Carter? Before we play out the theory, let’s break down it's more important aspects, so that it makes more sense in the end.
Captain Marvel: Kree-Skrull War
The new Captain Marvel movie is coming soon, right before Avengers 4 in fact, and the recent trailers showcasing the film have given the strong indication that the plot of the movie seems to revolve around the Kree-Skrull War.
The Kree-Skrull War is a Marvel event that involves the Earth getting wrapped up in a war between two alien races: the Kree and Skrulls. It precludes the Secret Invasion Marvel event.
Now Secret Invasion is a Marvel event that involves the Skrulls impersonating Marvel’s heroes in a plot to take over the world. The result is that heroes end up fighting exact copies of their allies and they can’t trust anyone.
Considering Captain America is a major figurehead in the Marvel universe (being the first Avenger and all) his turning out to be a Skrull would definitely be a way to get the heroes to doubt everything that they know and not trust one another.
The secret invasion story arc would be in full swing at this point as it would mean the Skrulls have reintroduced themselves in the MCU. Remember that Captain Marvel takes place in the mid-’90s, which should roughly be a little over twenty years in the past for the MCU. So they’ve been out the game for a while at this point.
Captain Marvel would, of course, have to explain what’s going on to her comrades since she would be the only one who knows what’s going on (Doctor Strange too, if he looked far enough into the future).
Once Steve Rogers has been outed as Skrull, the question on everyone’s mind becomes “where is the real Steve Rodgers,” or “did we ever know the real Steve Rodgers at all?”
Time Travel Theory
To best answer that question, we have to first dive into another popular theory, one that revolves around the concept of time travel.
During Infinity War, Doctor Strange plays out what’s now a pretty famous scene. While waiting for Thanos to arrive, Strange uses the time stone to peer into the future to see if there’s any way he and his allies win. What he sees is over 14 million possible outcomes and only one them is a positive future.
However, Strange is never able to share with his team the necessary steps they need to take in order to achieve this future. Instead, the Battle of Titan seemingly goes horribly wrong and in order to save Tony, Strange gives up his claim on the time stone to Thanos. His only response afterward is “this was the only way,” and just before he fades to dust he states “we’re in the endgame now.”
While all of this is happening, Scott Lang, Ant-Man, is making a journey into the quantum realm, and just before he dives in, he’s told to watch out for “time vortexes”--anomalies that will throw him into a different time period should he allow himself to be sucked into them. If that happens his group won’t be able to save him.
This is where the theory comes in. Basically, Doctor Strange participated in a battle he knew was fruitless in order to give Scott enough time to get himself into the quantum realm. He then gave Thanos the time gem, and Thanos used the infinity stones to wipe out half of all life. As a result, Scott’s only way out of the realm is destroyed and he’s left with only one option: the time vortexes.
The gist is that Strange stranded Scott so that he would use the time vortexes to lead him to the Avengers in the future and give them a chance to go back in time and stop Thanos’ from getting all the Infinity Stones.
This leads us to the Captain America theory.
“Captain America a Skrull?” Scenario
When Scott takes the dive into the time vortexes he arrives into the “post-snap” future. It’s also been a few years, as evident by the age of Scott’s daughter. Captain Marvel has also already been on earth for a good number of those years, helping the Avengers out any way she can. This assumption comes from the fact that Nick called her just before he died (we’ll probably see her actual return to earth in end-credits scene of her movie).
Cap and Tony have also regrouped and Tony has put aside his grievances for the moment or even permanently. He did watch his “ward” die in his arms in Infinity War, so his main priority is just figuring out a way to bring him and the rest of the “dusted” back.
Unbeknownst to everyone, when the Skrulls received word of Captain Marvel’s arrival and discovered her association with the rest of the Avengers they put their plan for revenge into action.
Scott explains his situation to the Avengers, letting them know that he traveled back from the past through the use of time vortexes, and this gives the group the idea to set Strange’s plan into motion.
Tony gets to work building another quantum generator since he’s the best one suited for figuring out Hank Pym’s technology, but he completes the project in a rush and doesn’t notice that the machine can’t fully handle fully control the time vortexes with 100 percent accuracy.
So, he takes the Avengers into the quantum realm, but unbeknownst to them, the Skrulls have put their plan into motion. They’ve known Captain Marvel’s been back for some time and have been preparing to take revenge against her for their defeat. They’ve had time to analyze her allies, and a Skrull replaces Steve Rogers just as the group heads back in time. The real Steve is instead thrown into another time vortex.
When the fight with Thanos is finished, Captain Marvel notices Steve is a Skrull and puts him down, revealing him to everyone.
The real Steve is flung back into his original time, just after his plane crashes. After figuring out where he is and having no way to return home he decides to go have his date with Peggy.
Conclusion
This theory plays out more like a what-if story, but it’s an interesting alternative to the end of Chris Evans’ Captain America. It provides the character with a well-deserved happy ending, and kind of leaves him with the ability to return for future installments if he wants to come back. Although, it would have made more sense as a theory if it suggested that the Skrulls had been on earth since Cap’s original timeline and instead of Nick Fury finding the real Cap, he found a Skrull instead.
