Honestly, though, that’s just the top of the Public Domain Patriotic Super Hero Iceberg. We also have:

Even Captain America has an appearance that has fallen in to the Public Domain. This time, he was a gun wielding District Attorney/Vigilante named Grant Gardner, working to bring down crime at home, in a Republic film serial.

Grant Gardner is Captain America (or something?)

Watch for yourself:

So, while we can’t do anything about Actual Nazi Steve Rogers, there’s a lot we can do about the fact that many (most?) of America’s modern folk heroes are controlled by ageless corporate behemoths. Since so many of these characters have their basis in, or share striking similarities with, Public Domain heroes, there’s nothing stopping us from re-inventing the modern American Folk hero from our own cultural commons.

Wouldn’t it be great to have a way to use a folk hero to comment on a specific moment in time, without forever marring the reputation of that hero as a Nazi? Wouldn’t you love to see a comic where The Shield has to fight Grant Gardner’s Captain America, after he veers from patriotism to bigotry?

Our Public Domain is not nearly as rich as it should be, or as it could be, but it does present a deep well of collectively owned content from which we can draw to tell new and different stories.

It’s up to each and every one of us to protect our cultural icons and folk heroes, and ensure that they represent our diverse community, and not just the interests of corporate monoliths. Many of you are already writing fanfiction to make your favorite franchises more representative of your own views and morals, and that’s awesome. You can expand on that by working with characters that are in the Public Domain, freeing yourself from the dubious legality (or outright illegality) of working with copyrighted characters.

We can create things, together, while righting the wrongs of corporate missteps.