She-Hulk has just clarified a debate that has raged on the Internet for more than a decade: is Captain America a virgin?
It’s a conversation that starts in She-Hulk, the flashy new comedy from Disney+ that delights in poking fun at the seriousness of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. While in the car with her cousin Bruce Banner, aka Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Jennifer Walter (Tatiana Maslany) asks Bruce what he knows about Captain America’s sex life.
She explains her theory. “Steve Rogers didn’t have a girlfriend before he entered the service,” she says.
“Says who?” Hulk asks.
“That story string,” says Jennifer. “So he becomes Captain America, and from that moment, symbol of America, he is rushed to the front line. He becomes a war hero. Then he is frozen in ice. So, from all that you told me, after he thaws out, he goes from world threatening disaster to world threatening disaster That’s when he’s not a fugitive from the law, right? So it looks like he was pretty, pretty busy… Obviously, Captain America was a virgin.
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Before Bruce can respond, their back and forth is interrupted by a spaceship. Luckily, the two will return to the conversation before the episode ends and reveal some tantalizing news.
In case you missed the ongoing Steve Rogers chastity debate, there are a few other reasons why fans have long suspected Cap (Chris Evans) is a virgin. Steve Rogers’ Boy Scout persona combined with 1940s sexual mores suggest he wouldn’t have lost his virginity until he received the super-soldier serum during World War II.
Tatiana Maslany in She-Hulk: Lawyer
Courtesy of Marvel Studios
He is notorious for never getting to take the love of his life, Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell), on a date before he crashes into a plane to save the world, suggesting that they were unable to consummate the relationship before it was frozen for several decades. (That is, until he travels back in time to find her at the end of Avengers: Endgame-But more on that later.)
And his undying love or Peggy suggests that he would have remained faithful to her even once awakened from cryogenic sleep in the modern age. Of course, he flirts with Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. But she ends up with Bruce Banner, at least for a while, and we never see any awkward conversations about a love triangle on the Avengers compound, so we can assume nothing actually happened between the two.
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His only other suggested love interest is Peggy’s great-niece, Sharon Carter (Emily VanCamp), which is disgusting. The two lips lock (again, disgusting), but let’s hope and assume they never did more considering Steve is probably his great-uncle (disgusting!).
Now we the audience know that Captain America is definitely not a virgin at the end of Avengers: Endgame. In the final minutes of this film, Steve Rogers travels back in time to find young Peggy and live out the rest of his life with her. We know of Captain America: The Winter Soldier that Peggy got married and had two children, and End of Game seems to confirm that her invisible husband was actually Steve Rogers after the time travel.
It is unknown when Steve travels back in time if Steve and Peggy reunite in a parallel timeline or if Steve was Peggy’s husband all along and fathered her two children. Considering the elusive way Peggy talks about her partner in The Winter Soldier, it is safe to assume the latter. The writers of End of Game suggested it as much.
But, apparently, Jennifer and maybe even Bruce think Captain America is dead at the time of She-Hulkwhich takes place afterEnd of Game. The whole world wouldn’t know about his time travel shenanigans. It seems like a secret that Cap’s best friends, Anthony Mackie’s Sam Wilson and Sebastian Stan’s Bucky Barnes, have been keeping close.
In an end credits scene from the first episode of She-Hulk, Jennifer pretends to cry drunkenly over the disappearance of what Ant-Man affectionately called “America’s ass.” ” It’s so sad. Steve Rogers did so much for his country and he never had the opportunity to experience sex,” she says. “Have you seen that ass? That donkey didn’t deserve to die a virgin. It’s like, so sad.
Bruce gives in. “Steve Rogers is not a virgin,” he says. “He lost his virginity to a girl in 1943 on the USO Tour.”
Jennifer immediately drops the act with tears in her eyes. “Yes, I knew that,” she said triumphantly.
To think about the circumstances under which Steve would have shared this information with Bruce is pretty hilarious on its own. I guess there was plenty of time to kill around Avengers HQ in those five years during the Blip. But finally confirmation.
And in case you think it’s a diversion from Marvel canon, let Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige assure you it’s not: in an interview with Variety, She-Hulk Showrunner Jessica Gao said she asked Feige the question and got the answer “straight from Kevin’s golden mouth.”
“I can’t describe to you how thrilled and shocked I was that not only was Kevin on board to answer the question,” she said, “that he provided me with the canon answer.”
For her part, Jennifer is delighted. “Captain America fu—” she shouts, then the screen cuts out because it’s a PG show. After many years of worrying that America’s greatest soldier has ever been fucked, we share Jennifer’s enthusiasm.
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