Black Widow (Review)
The MCU Finally Tries to Do Right by Black Widow
Well, Black Widow finally got a movie of her own, even though she died in Avengers: Endgame back in 2019. I was never a big fan of Scarlett Johansson’s Natasha Romanov in the MCU because it seemed like Marvel really didn’t know what it was doing with the character. Fortunately, they actually got their act together a bit with Black Widow, and while it won’t earn a top 10 spot among the movies of the MCU, it is a fun action flick that has a lot going for it. At the same time, Black Widow serves as a reminder that Marvel has a history of struggling with their female characters and still hasn’t figured out that heroes are only as good as their villains. Most of these strengths and weaknesses cancel each other out, but the saving grace for the film is the tenacious chemistry and charisma among the leads.
Natasha Romanov’s past was always shrouded in darkness, and after years of running, it’s finally caught up to her. She discovers that the dreaded Cold-War Red Room program responsible for making her into Black Widow was never shut down. In fact, it’s more powerful than ever and has been pulling the strings of world events from the shadows. Never the type to leave a job unfinished, Romanov sets out to destroy the Red Room once and for all. In order to do that, she’s going to need some help from her past as well. The “lone wolf” reunites the closest thing she ever had to a family which comprises of sister Yelena (Florence Pugh), who is an infuriatingly snarky elite assassin, mother Melina (Rachel Weisz), a scatterbrained but brilliant scientist, and father Alexi (David Harbour), a washed-up super-soldier. If this ragtag group has any hope of saving the world, they’ll need to bury a few hatchets and hug it out before the next generation of Widows and ultra-merc Taskmaster catches up with them.
I adored the four leads in Black Widow, especially once they all get in the same room with one another. Each of them has a back-breaking amount of baggage, especially with one another, but there’s a depth to their eccentricities that is pure gold. Harbour’s Alexi has a knack for always saying the wrong thing, but underneath the poor choice of words are genuine messages of love and compassion for his adopted family. The story might not be perfect, but the dialogue penned by Eric Pearson, Jac Schaeffer, and Ned Benson has some real gems that create genuine intimacy among the characters. Florence Pugh though is by far and away the scene-stealer of Black Widow. Her “grounded” sense of sarcasm and dry sense of humor makes Yelena Belova one of my favorite characters in the MCU. If anything, Black Widow is worth seeing just for the debut of Plugh’s new heroine, who I can’t help hoping is a big part of the franchise’s future.
As I mentioned, there is a villain problem in Black Widow. Taskmaster is meant to be a character who can perfectly copy any physical action once they’ve seen it. That basically means if they watch a bunch of Bruce Lee’s movies, they’ll be able to perfectly copy his fighting style. There was endless potential to play with, but Taskmaster barely gets any real screen time to show off these skills. The third act tosses them into the mix, but never allows Taskmaster to prove just how terrifying a villain they are. The same goes for the big bad guy in charge of the Red Room (Ray Winstone), who barely makes an impression aside from the typical villain speech they all get in the MCU. The biggest waste though was the new Widows, who consisted of some incredibly talented stuntwomen. A whole team of Black Widows hell-bent on taking down the OG sounds like the John Wick: Chapter 2 of the MCU, but even the biggest fights feel uninspired. In fact, Taskmaster copying moves from other Avengers is the perfect metaphor for the action sequences in general.
Not that the visual effects look bad by any stretch of the imagination. There are some really cool ideas that Black Widow plays with to compensate for the lack of godly super-powered individuals this time around. I’m not going to spoil the big twists or reveals, but Black Widow has to rely on other ways to create massive collateral damage. The effects team definitely earns their paycheck with some of the cooler scenes and despite being uninspired, I did enjoyed watching them pull from the MCU’s greatest hits. No matter how much the story might struggle in some Marvel movies, you can always count on them to still be exciting. Even the films at the bottom of the barrel (Iron Man 2, The Incredible Hulk, Thor…) all look outstanding and are nothing short of epic in their finer moments. Black Widow might not be top 10 material, but it’s far from the bottom of the MCU’s barrel.
Black Widow is the MCU’s attempt at making a Bond movie. Technically, you could call it a spy flick, but only in the loosest sense of the genre. I get the strong feeling that Marvel only made this film out of sheer obligation and makes no effort to really give the heroine any sort of justice (in fact, sounds like they didn’t do Johansson justice either). Don’t get me wrong, director Cate Shortland is phenomenal at capturing the emotional core of the characters and the visual effects are everything we’ve come to expect from the franchise. However, she placed in the tough position of giving a mediocre character (thanks to the MCU) a send off while simultaneously handing off the baton to her successor, Pugh’s character (who I can’t wait to see more of!). Despite being a stumble after a recent slew of hit superhero flicks though, Black Widow is fun and worth seeing just for the misfit “heroes” at its core.
