Every week, we will be examining comic book stories, plots and ideas that were abandoned by a later writer while still acknowledging that the abandoned story DID still happen. Click here for an archive of all the previous editions of Abandoned Love. Feel free to e-mail me at bcronin@comicbookresources.com if you have any suggestions for future editions of this feature.

Today (based on a suggestion by reader Justice--!) we look at how quickly Marvel dropped one of Steve Gerber's plots from his short Captain America run.

Steve Gerber's run on Captain America turned out to be very short-lived, just #221-225, and that's with #224 being an inventory story that was plugged in as a fill-in!

However, in these few short issues, Gerber did some notable stuff, including completely changing Captain America's origin. Gerber's changes were subsequently abandoned and forsaked during Roger Stern and John Byrne's run (you can read about that here).

It is interesting to note that Gerber had ANOTHER bit that was dropped even sooner.

In #225, the issue where we learn Cap's new origin, Cap is strapped to a special mental device to access his hidden memories (that reveal his secret origin, including the fact that he had a brother who died during the attack at Pearl Harbor)...

At the end of the issue, though, the mental trauma from re-living these painful memories was too much...

Seems like Gerber had something planned for this cliffhanger, right?

Well, he was off the book with #225, so writer Roger McKenzie joined the title with the next issue and he was not interested in continuing Gerber's plot, so he quickly addresses it with Cap just, you know, getting better...

And then never bringing it up again (besides a real quick mention in #227 where Cap just mentions "Now that I'm back at full strength").