One Marvel Villain’s Plot to Kill Hitler Reveals a Dark Truth of Superhero Comics

Warning: Spoilers for Avengers: Twilight #1!The Red Skull’s plot to kill Adolf Hitler highlights a dark secret about supervillains in the Marvel Universe. Johann Shmidt aka the Red Skull has a reputation for being arguably Captain America’s most personal, prevalent foe and one of the most dastardly villains to come out of Marvel’s history. His character has always been deeply connected to the Nazis and Adolf Hitler, but his dark fate solidifies how he’s destined to surpass even Hitler’s evil.

Red Skull’s final plan to be better than Hitler comes to fruition in Avengers: Twilight #1 by Chip Zdarsky, Daniel Acuna, and VC’s Cory Petit. In the distant future, misinformation and revisionist history swings public sentiment in Red Skull’s favor. An older Steve Rogers watches in horror as a new documentary praises the Red Skull as a hero for his plot to kill Hitler.

As Steve points out (and the documentary neglects to mention), Red Skull’s whole intention for killing Hitler was to usurp him in power. But the bigger problem lies in the fact that no matter what, a bigger villain is always around to replace another in defeat.

Red Skull is Praised as a Hero in a Dark Future

Avengers: Twilight takes place in a dystopian future where superheroes have fallen out of favor in the public eye, thanks to failing to defeat the one MCU villain capable of defeating the Avengers. Several years after the fact, a Super Soldier Serum-free Steve Rogers is retired and married to a doctor named Rosa. In retirement, Steve stumbles upon an advertisement for a news television program titled Red Between the Lines, featuring a familiar face from his past as a superhero.

The commercial teases that while readers understand the Red Skull was Adolf Hitler’s right-hand man once upon a time ago, new information suggests that he was actually working against Hitler. The documentary posits that Shmidt was trying to take down the Third Reich and its leader from the inside, and hints that the Red Skull was some sort of secret hero this whole time. This enrages Cap to no end because he knows the truth of the matter. While Red Skull was planning to betray Hitler, it was so he could lead the Nazis himself.

The Worst Part of Being a Superhero

This emphasizes a recurring dilemma that comes with being a superhero in the Marvel Universe: the constant uphill battles against larger and larger threats. Even after a major evil is vanquished, there is always a bigger evil waiting to strike from the shadows. Another example of this involving the Red Skull can be seen in the recently launched Thunderbolts series by Collin Kelly, Jackson Lanzig and Geraldo Borges. After the Winter Soldier defeated the villainous organization known as the Outer Circle, a present-day Red Skull has moved in to snatch up their resources and power for himself.

Red Skull was fully prepared to usurp Hitler and lead the Third Reich himself. Though Hitler was defeated in World War II, Shmidt survived and continued to plot new ways to seize power. Even worse, Red Skull’s villainy did end up usurping Hitler in the sense that misinformation has afforded him a new legion of followers decades in the future. Captain America inadvertently helped his nemesis to spread his fascism, and now, Red Skull has succeeded.