He reads about the upcoming fight between Thundra and the Thing in a newspaper.
He heads to NYPD headquarters but is attacked along the way. The goons reveal their allegiance to a 'cowled commander' before Cap defeats them. He meets with Commissioner Feingold, who tells him of potential corruption within the force. Feingold then leaves the room, and a huge explosion destroys the office. He manages to survive by using his shield and barrelling out of the window. He bides his time and confronts the perpetrator behind the blast - Viper - but a venom-tipped quill catches and weakens Falcon. Cap beats Viper up, but stops when Viper offers an antidote for Falcon in return for his freedom. Cap takes the antidote but Viper shoots him with a quill also when his back is turned.
Frozen in a mass of ice, Captain America is an object of worship by an Eskimo tribe until Namor hurls him back to the sea. He comes out of suspended animation inside the Avengers' submarine. He explains how, twenty years ago, his partner Bucky perished as he tried to stop a sabotaged prototype airplane being blown up while Cap plummeted to the bottom of the ocean. After some rest, he meets Rick Jones in New York, whom he first confuses with Bucky. Together, they find the Avengers who have been turned to stone by an alien who agrees to bring them back to normal in exchange for their help in recovering his spaceship at the bottom of the ocean. After they resist an attack from Namor, Captain America accepts to join the Avengers.
Still on the trail of the Hulk, the Avengers find clues of his presence in New Mexico. But their former teammate is now in New York City and has defeated the Fantastic Four. They travel back home where they face the Hulk. Soon, the Fantastic Four have regrouped and join them in the fight, but since they never fought side-by-side, they only get in each other's way. Realizing this, they decide to collaborate and finally manage to defeat the Hulk who disappears into the Hudson River.
On the trip back from New Mexico, Cap demonstrates the gadgets that Iron Man has added to his shield. While Rogers longs for revenge, Baron Zemo tells his pilot how Captain America was responsible for his hood being forever glued to his face, and how he got his revenge when later he sabotaged a prototype airplane which blew up with the hero and his partner Bucky. Zemo assembles a team composed of the Black Knight, the Melter, the Radioactive Man and himself to battle their respective nemesis in the Avengers. The heroes defeat the Masters of Evil by switching enemies to destabilize them.
Rick Jones commits the faux-pas of donning Bucky's costume and Cap tells him that he will never have another partner. Cap tracks down Baron Zemo in the Amazon Jungle and confronts him. As he destroys his palace, Zemo chooses to fly way, unaware that his enemy has hitched a ride clinging to his ship's hull. After it lands in New York, Cap attacks him but he is put unconscious by the Executioner. Thor entraps the villains' ship into a space warp.
The Pentagon ask the Avengers to deal with the threat of Kang the Conqueror who came from the future to claim Earth for himself. They attack him but Kang easily confines the male members of the team inside his ship. They are freed by the Teen Brigade and the Wasp soon arrives with a weapon with which Giant-Man destroys Kang's suit. Defeated, the Conqueror is forced to flee in his ship.
The Avengers meet Wonder Man for the first time as he helps them fight the Masters of Evil. Then the Avengers discover this is all a set up to lure them to South America where they all get captured by the villains. Ultimately, Wonder Man redeems himself and sacrifices his life when he saves the heroes from Zemo who is about to kill them.
During a meeting, Captain America refuses Iron Man's proposition that Rick Jones be officially admitted as member of the Avengers, concerned for the boy's life. When Immortus captures Rick, each Avenger must confront a legendary figure to free him. Before all his champions are defeated, Immortus takes Captain America to 1760 in the Tower of London where he sets his friend free. Meanwhile, the Masters of Evil attack the Avengers and gain the upper hand until Cap returns victorious with Rick. The Enchantress casts a spell to bring her team back to the moment before they met Immortus, so for anybody else, it is as if nothing ever happened.
Led by Thor's hammer which has detected evil impulses in the Balkans, the Avengers engage in a fight against the X-Men. Professor X explains that Earth would be in peril if their foe Lucifer was to be slain and convinces them that they will handle the situation.
A convict named Deacon lures Captain America inside the state penitentiary to acquire his shield, convinced that its electronic devices will allow the prisoners to escape. But the hero has removed Iron Man's upgrades some time ago because they ruined the shield's balance. With the help of the guards, Cap put the prisoners back in their cells.
After being rejected by the army as physically unfit, Steve Rogers is selected for a project to create an army of super soldiers. He is the first to be administered the serum, which successfully enhances his body and mind, but the formula and its creator are both destroyed. After become Captain America, his identity is discovered by camp mascot Bucky Barnes who convinces him to take him as his partner.
With the Avengers on a break to attend to personal matters, Captain America trains Rick Jones on a few acrobatic moves. In New Mexico, the Avengers fight off the Lava Men who have been pushing an ever-growing rock outside of their subterranean domain. They learn that trying to make it explode would destroy both their races. When the Hulk appears and engages battle, the Avengers trick him into smashing the rock at a vulnerable spot, causing it to implode.
Cap visits S.H.I.E.L.D. HQ with Falcon and later fights Dr. Gorbo at a digging site ending with a fall into the pit.
His fall is cushioned by Mole Man, with whom he negotiates about the waste dumping.
Arrives at the digging site and delivers Mole Man's message. Not seeing Sharon among the gathered crowd he leaves with a grumpy mood which later leads to some harsh words towards Sam.
Cap follows Redwing to the location of the kidnapped Falcon. They vanquish Stoneface together. After the fight Cap gets called away mysteriously.
Cap goes on a secret mission as a police rookie in disguise and finds the wrongdoer of his case.
After an Avengers meeting, Cap stays at Tony's mansion to teach Iron Man some judo holds.
Investigating the murder of military officers, Captain America and Bucky face the Red Skull for the first time.
Cap fights the Grey Gargoyle and saves civilians who'd gone missing. Later he visits the SHIELD Helicarrier and reunites with Sharon, learning about Element X.
Cap finds Sam turned into stone. He brings Sam back to SHIELD. Cap later confronts the Grey Gargoyle on the Helicarrier and manages to save Sam, Nick and Sharon.
Before confronting the Gargoyle, Cap promises Sharon they will be together from now on. He and the Falcon then confront the Grey Gargoyle, luring him into a stone rocket, getting rid of him and Element X.
After reporting for police duty and a date with Sharon, they find an injured Sam. Cap then goes on the stop the revolt of the People's Militia ultimately revealing the real identity of their leader. Cap later escapes Red Skull's trap, but is not able to catch his arch enemy.
Captain America stops by Giant-Man's lab to ask him and the Wasp to take care of the threat of Colossus in Africa.
Captain America fails to understand why Iron Man attacks him at Avengers headquarters then leaves. Cap hides in a power plant where the Golden Avengers finds him and resumes battle. The fight ends when Giant-Man and the Wasp expose that the Chameleon set the heroes against each other.
At Avengers HQ, Captain America gets a call from Reed Richards who is looking for Spider-Man.
Captain America and his fellows Avengers go to a charity event outside New York.
On duty assignment as Avengers Headquarters, Captain America protects the contents of their vault against Bull and his gang of thieves.
As the Avengers are about to investigate the sinking of entire city blocks into the ground, the Fantastic Four inform them that this is the Mole Man's doing so they prefer to handle the situation themselves.
During an athletic exhibition, Captain America is attacked by an army of assassins sent by Zemo, but he manages to beat them all. Then he broadcasts a TV message publicly calling Zemo a coward.
The Avengers vote a leave of absence for Iron Man who has been missing after the announcement of Tony Stark's death. Spider-Man offers to join the team, announcing that their armored comrade has been taken to Mexico by the Masters of Evil, but at the Temple of Tirod, the Avengers are ambushed by the webcrawler. As they free themselves, they understand that they were actually saved by the real Spider-Man who has disabled the robot replica of himself sent by Kang.
Because his brother once saved his life, Captain America travels to communist Vietnam and rescues an American pilot, Lieutenant Jim Baker, held prisoner by Vietcong General Wo, who is also a sumo wrestler.
Retelling of how Steve Rogers enrolled in the US Army and received the Super Soldier Serum that turned him into Captain America. Together, they take on a mission to destroy a Nazi submarine that came to the coastline to sabotage US defenses.
In a London pub, Steve Rogers is being bullied by a loud-mouthed American sergeant, and when Nick Fury intervenes, the situation turns into a bar fight. Arrived in France with Bucky, they spot Nazis transporting prisoners with shovels to work as slaves. Captain America sends a call for assistance to the Howling Commandos. Together, they manage to stop the digging of a tunnel through the Channel to invade Britain.
Intrigued by the mentalist act of two stage performers who can predict sabotages against US Army, Captain America and Bucky investigate and discover that the images that they project are actually films. They expose Sando as a Nazi agent whose role was to spread panic among American citizens.
Cap attends a charity event for children.
The Avengers are attending a fake charity event at Count Nefaria's castle where they are put in stasis. As they leave, the confused Avengers are attacked by the US Armed Forces and have to retreat to their HQ where they learn that they supposedly threatened to take over the government. Suspecting that Nefaria is behind this, they go back to his castle where they free the Teen Brigade, defeat the Count and force a confession that clears their names, but the Wasp has been hit by a stray bullet in the fight.
At the hospital, the Avengers learn that the Wasp is in critical condition and only one specialist may save her. But Dr. Svenson had agreed to help an alien race hiding in the North Pole and the Avengers find themselves caught in the middle of an interplanetary war. When the Yirbek locate their foe on Earth, the Avengers force the Kallusians to send them back to the hospital with the doctor and to take their conflict elsewhere. Svenson's operation on Janet is successful.
The current chairman of the Avengers chooses Thor, Goliath and Iron Man for on-call duty.
Steve Rogers writes a letter to Nick Fury to get a full-time job in counter-espionage. Having spotted the Executioner and the Enchantress, he calls the Avengers for an emergency meeting to warn them. When Rick Jones is pulled into an aircraft by an attractor beam, the Avengers follow after it and are attacked by the Masters of Evil. Cap decides to take his fight directly with Baron Zemo who has remained in the Amazon jungle. When he comes face to face with his archenemy, Zemo tries to shoot the Captain America with his disintegrator pistol but the hero blinds him with the sun's reflection on his shield. The blast hits a supporting rock above him and Zemo is crushed to death under a rockslide. After burying his enemy, Captain America and Rick come back home to find that Hawkeye, Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch have replaced his former teammates.
After capturing Captain America, the Red Skull tells him about his past and his origins. Then he wipes his mind clean to take control of him. For his first mission with the Nazis, he is ordered to fly to Britain to kill an Allied general. But at the last minute, his morals take over and he realizes he has been drugged to obey the Nazis. Joined by Bucky, they prevent the other Nazis from killing the general. Then they stop a Nazi agent from getting his hands on a secret weapon whose ray can vanish anything it hits.
Captain America feels that he might have some trouble leading the team, with Hawkeye already challenging his authority. As the Avengers are searching for the Hulk to add muscle to their team, they fall into a trap set by the Mole Man and find themselves in the pit of the Minotaur which they defeat. The Mole Man then decides to send them back to the surface before they destroy him too.
The Avengers travel to Sin-Cong to free its people of their Red tyrant, the Commissar, who turns out to be a robot controlled by the Communist army.
While Captain America attends Reed Richards and Sue Storm's wedding at Baxter Building, he realizes that the Fantastic Four are attacked by several of their old foes so he decides to lend a hand. He is attacked by the Cobra, the Executioner and the Enchantress. While the battle rages on, Reed Richards uses a machine that transports all their enemies back to the recent past with no memory of what occurred. Finally, Reed and Sue are wed in front of all their family and friends.
As he goes with his task force to occupied France on a mission to destroy records and communications at Gestapo's French Headquarters, Steve Rogers refuses to take Bucky with him. During the operation, he intercepts a Nazi message stating that his young friend was taken prisoner at Greymoor Castle. Thinking that their operation is completed, Rogers leaves the troop behind and hijacks a Nazi plane to rush across the Channel. He rescues Bucky from a defecting scientist and from Nazi soldiers. Realizing that he left his ranger unit in trouble in France, he uses an enemy missile to shatter the Nazi unit that has been chasing the Allied task force.
After telling his tale about Greymoor Castle to Wanda, Pietro and Hawkeye, Cap adds that he did not get trouble for deserting the platoon because high ranking officers knew about his secret identity and made up a cover story for his absence. Cap recalls how, 20 years ago, the seemingly dying Red Skull promised that three Sleepers would eventually emerge to bring glory back to the Third Reich. Thanks to a list of Nazi agents he kept from that time, Cap tracks down the Sleepers in Germany, and after seeing the first two merging together and spreading terror in their path, he races to a NATO installation where he warns General Logan and his army of the threat. But Cap and NATO's Army Corps arrive too late to stop the Third Sleeper from linking with the other two. Convinced that the machines are programmed to blast their way towards the core of the planet and trigger a chain reaction that will destroy Earth, Captain America jumps off the plane onto the deadly machine where he manages to detonate the bomb overseas.
After destroying the Sleepers and plunging to the ocean, Captain America is picked up by the crew of a passing ship and brought back home where he reminisces of his past as a soldier and of a lost love. In the street, Steve passes by a girl whose face looks very familiar. When the girl is attacked by Batroc the Leaper who steals a cylindrical package from her, he changes costume and goes after him. While they struggle, the cylinder containing Inferno 42 is damaged and the girl, who is actually a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, escapes with it. With 30 minutes before the substance destroys the whole city, Captain America and Batroc go after her to reseal the cylinder. While he reaches the agent who passed out because of the substance, Batroc recovers the cylinder and flees. Captain America fails to recover the cylinder, but as he goes back to check on the girl, she informs him that she was able to make a switch and hand over the Inferno to S.H.I.E.L.D.
When the Swordsman claims he wants to join the Avengers, Captain America finds out that he has been exiled from a dozen countries. Later, while he's training, he wonders why Nick Fury has not answered to his own offer to join his counter-intelligence unit. Next day, he gets a positive reply to his recent offer to join his counter-intelligence unit. But it turns out to be a trap set by the Swordsman who lures him to a warehouse where he attacks and captures him. When Cap's teammates come to rescue him, the villain threatens to push their friend down a building if they don't make him leader of the Avengers, but the hero jumps before they agree. With teamwork, they manage to save him. Then while they fight the Swordsman, their foe suddenly vanishes. Back at their headquarters, Hawkeye and Quicksilver once more question Cap's leadership, but finally come to a truce. Then they get a message from Iron Man saying that he vouches for the Swordsman's membership so they decide to take his word and give the man a chance despite their suspicions. Some time later, Cap and Hawkeye catch the Swordsman apparently setting a bomb, but the villain escapes with the bomb which detonates outside their HQ,
Hawkeye has resumed his criticizing of Captain America's leadership because of his old age, but they finally agree that these internal tensions are probably due to their inaction. Some time later, the Avengers experience some weird events where their interventions are perceived by the press as criminal. With more and more incidents involving them, the authorities force the Avengers to disband, and due to their already conflictive relationship, they part in bad terms. Disguised as a press agent, Captain America tricks Power Man to confess and with the compromising truth on tape, the authorities reinstate the Avengers' status and even decide that an official Avengers Day will be held. But later, Captain America tells his teammates that he's quitting anyway.
After his departure from the Avengers, Steve Rogers tries to pursue a career in boxing. But hearing in the news that his former partners have mysteriously disappeared, he tracks them down in the future to Kang's century where he rejoins with them. Realizing that Kang intends to overthrow the current king and marry Princess Ravonna, the Avengers choose to side with the people. Cap convinces the king's army to fight back, but Kang manages to take over anyway. Kang's refusal to slay the conquered princess provokes a rebellion amongst his commanders and the conqueror gets the help of the Avengers to stop the war and save the princess in exchange for their safe return to their century.
Back from Kang's century, Hawkeye resumes his attacks on Cap's leadership. Hearing that Wanda and Pietro may have relatives in Latveria, the other Avengers decide to accompany them, but it's all just a trap set by Doctor Doom who seals the land within a giant dome right after their arrival. Their joint effort enables the heroes to lift the dome away and escape.
