Captain America - Every National Hero In Marvel Comics Explained

The Cold War brought about Captain America's Russian counterpart Red Guardian. Alexei Shostakov, a Russian pilot and KGB agent, first appeared in 1967. The programme which created Red Guardian required that he fake his own death to ensure anonymity, even from his wife Natalia Romanov.

He received combat training and gadgets, including a magnetic throwing disc which attached to his belt for easy access. Add to that his red costume and hammer and sickle emblems, and the parallels with Captain America are anything but subtle. Unfortunately, his wife Natalia would switch allegiances from the Soviet Union: their eventual reunion and revelation of his true identity came only moments before his death protecting Black Widow and Captain America.

In Marvel's internal chronology, Shostakov was preceded by Aleksey Lebedev in the 1940s. This incarnation came into conflict with William Naslund’s Captain America shortly after WW II. Unlike his later counterparts, Lebedev’s Red Guardian was more critical of his home country – he was ultimately executed during the Soviet purges of the 1950s.

Other individuals to take the name of Red Guardian include Dr Tania Belinsky, more commonly known as Starlight, Josef Petkus who saw through the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the short-lived Krassno Granitsky, Life Model Decoy and former Crimson Dynamo Anton, and finally the current Red Guardian Nicolai Krylenko. Just as Captain America adapted to changing political climates, so too did Red Guardian evolve to fit whatever situation their home country found itself in.