Marvel Comics is no stranger to including supernatural elements in their comic books
and I’ve previously done an entire video dedicated to how the Marvel universe handles
vampires, but did you know that Captain America once became one in the nineties?
Because well, he did.
Because comics.
But before we get too far into things, I want to give a big thank you to my fiancee’s
favorite sponsor, Manscaped.
Look, if you’re hairy like a werewolf Captain America then these products are going to come
in handy and while I am a big fan of their stuff like the Lawn Mower 2.0, I am especially
a fan of their liquid products.
The Crop Preserver ball deodorant is especially important for me here in Texas and also, the
Crop Reviver is really good for if you don’t have time for a full shower, but you need
a little quick spritz to make sure that everything is all clean down there.
You can get all of this and more in the Perfect Package 2.0 which is going to have everything
that you’re going to need in order to keep your junk ver fresh.
If you want to get in on this for yourself then make sure to use the code “COMICD20”
at checkout for 20% off and free shipping!
Thank you guys so much for the sponsorship and now, back to the video!
So Captain America decided to take a break from the Avengers in order to find his missing
friend and pilot, John Jameson.
He’s the son of J. Jonah Jameson, a former astronaut, and is also a werewolf because
of a magic rock called the Moongem.
Well, at least he USED to be a werewolf before the stone turned to dust after an encounter
with Spider-Man.
First thing’s first, Cap checked to see if the Moongem’s dust was still secure.
It was not.
He then stopped by the Daily Bugle to talk with J. Jonah Jameson to see if he had heard
from his son.
He had not.
With few leads, Steve decided to team up with Doctor Druid, a former Avenger and expert
of the occult and together, they investigate rumors of alleged werewolf killings in Massachusetts.
Not only did they find a werewolf, but an entire TOWN of them.
Yup!
It turns out that a bad guy named Dredmund stole the moondust, reformed the Moongem,
developed a werewolf serum, and turned an entire town into his personal werewolf army.
Sounds like something straight out of a D&D campaign.
Now unbeknownst to Cap and Doctor Druid, Wolverine was also investigating the town, but he was
defeated and captured.
The bad guys tried turning Wolverine into a werewolf, but Logan’s healing factor was
so strong that he would metabolize it too quickly and revert back to normal.
Despite this, Dredmund was still able to brainwash Wolverine and sic ‘em on Cap.
This feral Logan swiftly defeated Captain America, captured him, and then Dredmund’s
evil scientist administered the werewolf serum, giving birth to Cap Wolf.
In addition to you know being a wolf man, this formula enhanced Steve's already super
strength which allowed him to easily break free from captivity.
It’s also worth noting that Rogers was injected with an even more potent version of the werewolf
formula which allowed him to stay transformed even in daylight.
While all of this was happening, Doctor Druid was investigating a different part of the
town, bumping into Dredmund and engaging him in a mental battle where they kind of just…
stare each other down.
Look, I know there is some super powerful stuff going on here, but this just looks kind
of dumb.
After getting distracted, Druid is defeated and chained up around the same time that Cap
Wolf fought Wolverine for a second time, but allowed himself to be captured.
If you think this was a dumb move, it actually makes a little bit of sense considering that
Cap’s mental state had deteriorated after the transformation, but he did still know
on a basic level that he wouldn’t be able to turn back into a human without the enemy's
help.
Steve was locked up with several other test subjects, but by using the combat skills that
he had retained in his muscle memory, Cap defeats their leader, a mysterious unnamed
white werewolf, without much difficulty.
Also among these prisoners is a mutant named Wolfsbane who you might know from the New
Mutants series.
She teaches Steve how to talk using his new wolf body which allowed him to rally the other
werewolves and escape even though he willingly went there in the first place.
On the way out, Rogers discovers that the werewolf serum is actually made from the blood
of a man named Jack Russell A.K.A.
Werewolf by Night.
At the same time, Feral from the X-Force (who I legitimately thought was just Wolfsbane
under a new code name until I read this storyline) was being drawn to the town, prompting her
teammate, Cable, to come after her.
Yeah, it really seemed like Marvel wanted all of their wolf characters in one spot for
this story.
Wait a second… did they add Wolverine to this because they legitimately thought that
he was a wolf.
I mean if that can confuse Hugh Jackman of all people then I guess I could see comic
book writers being confused by it too.
“I was doing some work on the wolves and he goes “Wolves?”
like to the whole crew “Why wolves?
You’re playing a wolverine.” and I go “Well that’s not an animal.” and he
goes “Yeah, it is.
Like out at the zoo.”
It was a humiliating moment and three weeks of wasted research.”
When Captain America’s wolf pack finally confronted Dredmund, the bad dude sliced into
the captive Doctor Druid and used his blood to activate the Moongem.
This transformed him into a cosmic level werewolf and he calls himself Starwolf.
Cable finally made it and joined in on the action, but Starwolf’s power was too great
even for the combined might of Cap Wolf and Cable.
During the fight, the white werewolf rescued Doctor Druid and injected Starwolf’s scientist
with the werewolf serum, meaning that if she wanted to change back, she was going to need
to create an antidote.
Which I imagine would be difficult considering that the transformation has been shown to
lower the victim's intelligence.
Try not to think about it too hard because clearly the writers didn't.
When Doctor Druid finally comes to, he frees Wolverine from the mind control, allowing
Logan to join in the fight.
Yet, he doesn’t end up doing much of anything.
He more or less just frees Rogers from some rubble.
Using the last of his strength, Cap Wolf was able to get the Moongem away from Starwolf,
reverting him back to human form and saving the day.
In the maybe twenty minutes of fighting, Starwolf's scientist was somehow able to make a cure
which was given to the afflicted werewolves and surprise surprise, it turns out that the
white werewolf was actually John Jameson the entire time!
So now that Steve found his friend, you’d think that that'd be the end of all tof this
weirdness, but NOPE!
You see, right as Steve was getting his cure, an evil Captain America suddenly bursts in!
He’s a doppelganger that was created during the Infinity War event about a year prior
complete with a black costume, fangs, and a literally edgy shield.
During the fight, the good Cap started reverting back to human form and despite losing his
werewolf strength, he defeated this evil twin who vanishes after the super quick fight.
Was there a point to this battle?
No.
I honestly think they did it just so they could justify having this cover.
Anyway, after fully reverting, John quits as Cap’s pilot, and everything goes back
to normal.
But if you take a look at the run time of this video, you’ll see that there’s is
still plenty more to talk about.
You see, Steve Rogers isn’t the only Captain America to become a werewolf.
Sam Wilson A.K.A.
The Falcon has been also become one…
twice.
Okay so remember that scientist that was working for Starwolf that developed the werewolf serum?
Well her supervillain name is Nightshade and she was first introduced in Captain America
#164 in 1973.
In this issue, she debuted the first iteration of the werewolf serum and used it on Sam,
but by the end of the issue, the sun had come out which reverted him back to human for good.
Yeah, there’s really not much to talk about here since the entire issue was pretty much
just Sam's transformation and his fight with Steve, but the much more exciting bit was
decades later after Wilson had taken up the mantle of Captain America.
Sam clashed with Doctor Karl Malus, a mad scientist that loves to experiment on living
beings.
During the fight, Sam got distracted and was knocked out, with Malus also capturing Redwing,
Wilson’s bird that he shares a psychic connection with because comics.
When Cap woke up… he found that Malus had experimented on him and turned him into a
wolf man and he needed his girlfriend, Misty Knight, to save him.
The two of them decided to track Malus down which leads to one of my favorite exchanges
in all of comics.
“Hey, is that Captain America?”
“He’s a werewolf now?
A flying werewolf?”
“A flying werewolf and a communist?
I liked him before but that’s too far.”
Sam and Misty found Malus, beat up his hench creatures, and discover that a kid named Joaquin
Torres… was spliced with Redwing’s DNA to become a human-falcon hybrid.
Also, since Redwing has a psychic connection to Sam, this kid now does too.
Although Malus was defeated, Sam didn’t turn back to human.
Plus, since he’s not a werewolf, the changes seemed to be permanent.
This was pretty damn funny because even though Sam was a lot more more articulate than Steve
was in wolf form, Wilson still had plenty of problems to overcome like getting fleas
and dealing with his desire to eat trash.
This transformation though really wasn’t that big of a hindrance.
I mean, outside of some jokes, the book was just business as normal.
I mean, Sam even took down an entire group of supervillains with the whole wolf thing
not really coming up.
Even the reversion back to human form wasn’t anything all that special since it just happened
off panel and it’s still to this day not really explained how it happened.
It’s also super weird considering that both Sam and Joaquin were both experimented on
by Malus, but only Sam reverted back to human form while Joaquin is still a human-falcon
hybrid and is still fighting crime under the codename of Falcon.
Why Sam turned back to normal is honestly a mystery that we’re never going to get
an answer to and even though this is super underwhelming, that’s really all I have
to say so this is my super underwhelming conclusion.
If you enjoyed this presentation then you might like the rest of the show.
It’s called Because Comics and I take a look at all of the crazy, strange, and straight
up bizarre things that make comic books well… comic books.
So if you enjoyed this, then I highly recommend watching the rest of the episodes.
Maybe you’ll get a kick out of it, but anyway, I hope you learned at least a little something
new and hopefully I’ll see you next time.