Marvel’s Captain America Is Now Cap-Snake — And He’s Sinking His Fangs Into the Avengers

Avengerssss… assssemble. Marvel’s Avengers Assemble — a five-issue series written by Steve Orlando with art by Cory Smith, Scot Eaton, Marcelo Ferreira, Valentina Pinti, and Jose Luis — saw Steve Rogers recruit Earth’s mightiest heroes to the new AVENG.E.R.S.: the Avengers Emergency Response Squad. Hawkeye (Clint Barton), Wonder Man (Simon Williams), She-Hulk (Jennifer Walters), Shang-Chi, Photon (Monica Rambeau), Lightspeed (Julie Powers), Hercules, Night Thrasher (Dwayne Taylor), Lightning (Miguel Santos), and the Wasp (Janet van Dyne) answered the call to battle the Red Skull’s daughter, Sin, the Red Ghost and the radioactive ghosts of his Super-Apes, the vampire hunters the Night Stalkers, and Doctor Doom’s former fiancée, Zora Vukovic, a.k.a. Victorious.

Meanwhile, the Serpent Society — a snake-themed squad of supervillains formed by Viper (Jordan Dixon) to battle Captain America in 1985’s Captain America #310 — has used the crises to pull off a series of heists undetected. Now calling himself Pit Viper, Dixon has had his Serpents steal the components of the Serpents’ Tears to serve their deity, the original serpent who slithered into the Garden of Eden: the demon lord Mephisto.

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In this week’s Avengers Assemble #4 by Orlando and Luis, Captain America, Shang-Chi, Lightspeed, Night Thrasher, Wasp, and Hawkeye travel to the Republic of Attania to stop the Serpent Society while Photon, Wonder Man, Lightning, She-Hulk, and Hercules take on Victorious in Latveria, which has been magically sealed off with a barrier by the new Sorcerer Supreme: Doctor Doom.

But the Serpent Society — including Sidewinder, Bushmaster, Copperhead, Anaconda, and new members Tiger Snake and the towering Titanoboa — manage to complete the Serpents’ Tears, with each ampule “toxic enough to infect a city.” These “holy weapons,” as Pit Viper calls them, were crafted in tribute to the true serpent: not the Elder God Set, but Mephisto. Every victim of the Serpents’ Tears will be an offering to the Satan serpent.

After Shang-Chi suffered the toxic touch of Tiger Snake, Pit Viper targets the master of kung-fu as the Serpent Society’s first test subject. But this turns out to be a ploy to get the selfless Steve Rogers to “jump on the grenade” — as Pit Viper knew he would — and the liquid Serpents’ Tears transforms Captain America into a snake-like monster.

“The Tears are a compound toxin,” Pit Viper explains. “Part possession, part gene therapy. They bring holistic ruin to the cells. In other words… there is no Steve Rogers anymore. What remains of Captain America now serves the Serpent!”

Over the decades, the Serpent Society has consisted of the likes of Viper, Black Mamba, Rock Python, Asp, Rattler, Boomslang, Cottonmouth, Puff Adder, and Diamondback. But now they have a new member: Cap-Snake.

The Mephisto-worshipping Serpent Society is set to battle the AVENG.E.R.S. in Avengers Assemble #5, on sale Jan. 15 from Marvel Comics.

Avengers Assemble #5

CAP-SNAKE VS. THE AVENG.E.R.S.! The Serpent Society has harnessed Mephisto’s power to create a serum capable of raining destruction on civilization – and their first victim is Captain America! Is Cap-Snake what this team of villains finally needs to defeat the Avengers and reign supreme?