Marvel's Black Widow Director On Future Of The Character

The Marvel movie Black Widow should've hit theaters back in May, but like all major movies due for release over the past few months, it has been delayed. The film is now set to arrive in November, but ahead of that, director Claire Shortland has been talking about where the character goes from here.

Black Widow is a prequel, and as anyone who's seen Avengers: Endgame knows, star Scarlett Johansson is unlikely to return for many more Marvel films. Luckily, Black Widow is just a codename for a group of highly trained Russian agents, and there's another key character in the upcoming film played by Midsommar's Florence Pugh. As Shortland told Empire, Pugh's character of Yelena Belova is a key part of the movie.

"[Marvel boss Kevin Feige] realized that the audience would expect an origin story so, of course, we went in the opposite direction," she said. "And we didn't know how great Florence Pugh would be. We knew she would be great, but we didn't know how great. Scarlett is so gracious, like, ‘Oh, I'm handing her the baton.' So it's going to propel another female storyline."

Shortland also addressed the fact that many fans weren't happy about the way Natasha exited the MCU in Endgame, and promised that Black Widow would give her a more "fitting ending."

"The fans were upset that Natasha did not have a funeral," she said. "Whereas Scarlett, when I spoke to her about it, said Natasha wouldn't have wanted a funeral. She's too private, and anyway, people don't really know who she is. So what we did in this film was allow the ending to be the grief the individuals felt, rather than a big public outpouring. I think that's a fitting ending for her."

Black Widow also stars David Harbour, Rachel Weisz, O.T. Fagbenle, and Ray Winstone. The first Black Widow trailer was released in December. A "special look" preview appeared in January, while the latest trailer was released in March.

Black Widow was meant to be the first of two Marvel movies releasing in 2020, with the Eternals following in November. However, it has now been pushed to February 2021. For more MCU coverage on GameSpot, check out our guide to everything that's on the way as part of Marvel's Phase 4.