A frail volunteer becomes a super soldier, fails to stop the Red Skull, spends fifty years frozen, and wakes into a world that has kept going.
Every beat that the 2011 film would later make famous is already here: the serum, the war, the Red Skull, the ice, the man out of time. Matt Salinger plays Rogers, Albert Pyun directs, and the whole thing was produced by the 21st Century Film Corporation, a company that no longer exists.
It is worth watching as an argument about resources rather than ideas. The story Marvel would eventually spend two hundred million dollars telling was told here for a fraction of that, and the difference is not in the plot.
Show detailsWhy the date looks wrong
The catalogue records 14 December 1990, a United Kingdom date, because the film had no United States theatrical release. It got a limited run abroad and then went to video and cable television in the United States in the summer of 1992, through a home video label.
The article contradicts itself here in a way worth knowing about: its infobox gives the 1990 United Kingdom date, its Versions list says the theatrical cut has been available in the United Kingdom since 1991, and its box office paragraph refers to a 1990 release in Europe. The certification behind the running time is dated November 1990, which supports the earlier date, so that is the one recorded here.
Sources
Facts last checked on Sep 7, 2026
Released: December 14, 1990