Red Guardian Fought Winter Soldier, Not Captain America – Theory Explained

Black Widow introduced the audience to Alexei Shostakov a.k.a. Red Guardian, the Russian equivalent of Captain America and who claims to have fought Steve Rogers himself – but what if he actually fought the Winter Soldier? The Marvel Cinematic Universe continues its expansion now that the Infinity Saga is over, and the highly-anticipated Phase 4 is covering both TV shows and movies. Phase 4 kicked off with three TV shows exclusive to Disney+, and on the movie side of the MCU, it kicked off with Black Widow, Natasha Romanoff’s (Scarlett Johansson) final adventure on the big screen.

Set between the events of Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War, Black Widow follows Natasha as she’s on the run after the Civil War conflict. Natasha goes back to Russia where she reunites with her “family” and joins forces with them one final time to bring down the Red Room, its leader Dreykov (Ray Winstone), and a mysterious villain known as Taskmaster. Natasha’s “family” is formed by Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh), Melina Vostokoff (Rachel Weisz), and Alexei Shostakov/Red Guardian (David Harbour), each with different skills and abilities that played an important plan in the defeat of Dreykov. One character who quickly won the audience over was Red Guardian, who claimed to have fought and defeated none other than Captain America.

At one point, Shostakov became the sole recipient of the Soviet version of the Super Soldier Serum, taking the identity of “Red Guardian” and becoming the Soviet counterpart to Captain America. Following the end of the mission that had him, Melina, Natasha, and Yelena acting as an American family, he was imprisoned in Russia. Black Widow showed Red Guardian arm-wrestling fellow prisoners and telling a story of how he defeated Captain America in the 1980s, with fellow prisoner Ursa Major pointing out that Steve Rogers was still frozen in ice at that time. Shostakov’s tale, then, is considered to be a lie, but what if he’s actually right and he did fight and defeat a version of Captain America, not exactly Steve Rogers?

A theory, posted on Reddit, suggests Red Guardian fought either the Winter Soldier or one of HYDRA’s other super-soldiers disguised as Captain America. The author explains that HYDRA operated throughout the Cold War, and the Red Room being a Soviet intelligence service, these two might have been rivals. HYDRA, then, could have sent the Winter Soldier or another one of its soldiers before they had to be put on stasis to take down the Red Room. Now, Shostakov was still working with Dreykov and the Red Room in the 1980s, and with Rogers missing, HYDRA might have wanted to give the impression that Captain America was still secretly active and working for them, and so disguised one of their soldiers as him. This would explain why Red Guardian is so sure he fought against Captain America (he even asked Natasha if he ever mentioned him) and defeated him, as the Winter Soldier’s skills and those of the other soldiers are inferior to those of Steve Rogers.

Although it’s not an impossible idea, it seems unlikely that HYDRA would have gone as far as to disguise its best weapon or one of its soldiers as Captain America only to bring the Red Room down (surely, if HYDRA wanted to do so, they would have used other methods). Whether there will be an explanation to Red Guardian’s Captain America story or not in future MCU movies or TV shows is unknown, so for now, viewers will make their own interpretations out of it, and will decide if he was lying or just got a bit confused.

About The Author

Adrienne Tyler
(3276 Articles Published)

Adrienne Tyler is a features writer for Screen Rant. She is an Audiovisual Communication graduate who wanted to be a filmmaker, but life had other plans (and it turned out great). Prior to Screen Rant, she wrote for Pop Wrapped, 4 Your Excitement (4YE), and D20Crit, where she was also a regular guest at Netfreaks podcast. She was also a contributor for FanSided’s BamSmackPow and 1428 Elm. Adrienne is very into films and she enjoys a bit of everything: from superhero films to heartbreaking dramas, to low-budget horror films. Every time she manages to commit to a TV show without getting bored, an angel gets its wings.

When she’s not writing, you can find her trying to learn a new language, watching hockey (go Avs!), or wondering what life would have been like had Pushing Daisies, Firefly, and Limitless not been cancelled. Breakfast food is life and coffee is what makes the world go round.

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Guillermo del Toro said “hi” to her once. It was great.

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