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After more than three decades on late-night television, David Letterman will step down as host of the Late Show after tonight's episode.


It's no surprise that the cast of Marvel's Avengers franchise — Robert Downey, Jr., Scarlett Johansson, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Jeremy Renner, and Chris Evans — have all found the time to join Letterman for a chat. But Earth's Mightiest Heroes and Indiana's favorite son actually go back much further than that.

We promise we are not making this up: Letterman starred in issue #239 of the Avengers comic book in 1984 (as seen on Hero Complex and Comic Book Resources). And it was glorious.


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Here's the premise, as best we can understand it. Wonder Man, a munitions heir slash aspiring actor slash tragically forgettable superhero, gets booked on Late Night (this was back before Dave decamped NBC for CBS) by his agent — on the condition that he bring the other, more interesting Avengers on the show with him. Fortunately, the Black Widow, Hawkeye, the Black Panther, and the Beast are all game.

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But everything goes south when a baddie in the studio audience attacks the unsuspecting Avengers. It's Dave himself who saves the day, smacking the villain over the head with a giant prop-comedy doorknob.


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If the casting director for Captain America: Civil War is reading this, I can think of one showbiz vet who's about to have a lot of free time on his hands.


Molly Fitzpatrick is senior editor of Fusion's Pop & Culture section. Her interests include movies about movies, TV shows about TV shows, and movies about TV shows, but not so much TV shows about movies.