One of the most interesting tidbits in Black Widow, the long-awaited standalone movie for Scarlett Johansson's Natasha Romanoff, was the Red Guardian's assertion that he faced off with Captain America back in his prime. The Red Guardian, played by Stranger Things' David Harbour, was active in the '80s, when Natasha was a child, before being imprisoned in a remote Russian gulag sometime between then and the MCU's present. Yet he claims in the movie that he and Captain America operated as contemporaries, rivals in the geopolitical conflicts of the era.

Whether his stories have any truth to them is up for debate. On one hand, it's easy to assume he's just being a blowhard, simply due to how the character generally behaves. On the other, it's strange that he would earnestly ask Natasha whether Steve ever mentioned him if he knew they'd never actually met. Harbour told Inverse that the stories are true, but the site also suggests he may have been speaking somewhat sarcastically.

Is it even possible that Red Guardian (real name Alexei Shostakov) and Captain America fought? After all, following World War II, Steve Rogers was frozen in ice for decades. Then again, thanks to The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, we know there were other American supersoldiers in the intervening years. Maybe Alexei fought a different Captain America? Or maybe he fought the Syeve Rogers who went back in time during Avengers: Endgame, decades of whose life remain unaccounted for in the MCU?