Movie Review: Black Widow

COVID gave way to the biggest breather the MCU has had since it really kicked into high gear with the release of The Avengers back in May 2012-with the last film (Spider-Man: Far from Home) being released back in early July 2019. Given that Avengers: Endgame represented the epic closing of a chapter and the fatigue that set in after being bombarded with multiple new films every year, having an unplanned break from this exhaustive world was actually a pretty nice treat. That hiatus from Marvel's primary attraction has finally come to a close with the release of Black Widow and in typical MCU fashion, they re-entered the cinematic space in reliably solid yet completely unremarkable fashion.

Although its been known for a long time that Black Widow was set after the events of Captain America: Civil War, seeing it in practice highlights just how baffling the choice to release this movie now is. As refreshing as it was to unplug from the all the explanatory Multiverse crap that Loki is pedaling for a brief moment, heading back to this chapter in the timeline feels completely unnecessary. All of the fallout from Civil War has long been resolved and none of the gaps Black Widow between the end of that film and the start of Infinity War fills in are overly significant. Seriously, how does Natasha going into hiding, aiming to take down the architect of the Red Room (Ray Winstone in a completely underdeveloped and useless villain role) aka the Russian spy program that robbed her of her chance of living a normal life then eventually acting as the peacemaker between the Steve Rodgers and Tony Stark sides of the Sokovia Accords dispute really change anything in the grand scheme of things?  If anything, using a previous era of this universe that no longer have any relevancy in this world as the backdrop for the lone solo movie of a now deceased original Avenger really just shows how little Marvel gives a shit about this character.

Aside from the hard to avoid questions over the timing of its release, Black Widow generally accomplishes what it set out to do. Tonally, its very much in line with Captain America: The Winter Solider and the aforementioned Civil War-rocking a grim spy plot with dark lighting, minimal levity and a host of quick cut fight scenes where the combatants walk away with real wounds. Romanoff's being forced to confront her past sins as a trained killer is a setup that has an unshakable darkness behind it and really leaning into that with a relatively gritty, cold film that doesn't pull out the inevitable cutesy "all is forgiven" redemption card until the very last minute was the right call.  

Funnily enough for a bleak, action-packed spy flick, Black Widow's best moments come when its dealing with Natasha's long abandoned "family". Director Cate Shortland-who exclusively made indie dramas prior to this-is much more comfortable handling these quiet moments than she is the big CGI setpieces and this greater than usual reliance on scenes with a grounded emotional backbone allows Scarlett Johansson along with MCU newcomers David Harbour, Rachel Weisz and likely future franchise pillar Florence Pugh-who play the other members of the fake family she was briefly apart of during her time as a Red Room spy-get to show off their elite acting chops. While they ultimately did Romanoff dirty by releasing this movie after she died, the degree of empathy they showed by exploring her traumatic past and how she and the people in her orbit handled the divergent paths they headed down once they were separated ensures that her legacy wasn't completely botched.

Will the sequencing and status as an underwhelming swan song for Black Widow matter if her fate is undone by the lazy revival mechanism that the multiverse allows for? Perhaps not. But if Marvel decides to keep Natasha dead and allows Pugh's Yelena to take over the mantle as expected, it'll be hard to shake this film's lack of weight. Johansson did as much as she possibly could to make this character an MCU staple despite consistently being treated as a second fiddle to Iron Man/Captain America/Thor/Spider-Man, and to give this character a second rate sendoff is just disrespectful to the contribution she made in establishing this universe as a cultural force.     

Grade: B