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Black Widow

I completely missed the rental charge mentioned earlier. I have Disney+, so it'll show up there eventually. I've also done a couple of the premiere showings and had my sister's family over, so we treated it like a super-cheap movie ticket. Got popcorn & candy, cleared the coffee table out of the way for the kids (this was for Raya, Mulan specifically) and made a movie night of it. I wouldn't have a problem with that for Black Widow either.

I agree WB has a good idea going--it worked on me since I jumped at the HBO Max deal and we've been using the heck out of the subscription. I avoided a HBO subscription for years after letting it lapse, but now it's worth it to my family. If Paramount can get to the same value for us I might consider them. So close to cutting the cord.
 
My wife and I actually drove to the theater intending to watch Wonder Woman 1984, only to discover the showtimes had changed since I looked them up the previous day. Ended up going back home and watching there. So it's nice to have options, but I'm definitely more favorable to the "included with the subscription" method of monetization.

We'll probably go to the theater for Black Widow anyway, though. Sort of a tradition to see all the Marvel films there with the kids.
 
Black Widow (2021)

Black_Widow_%282021_film%29_poster.jpg


As a big-time MCU fan, I never thought that the character of Natasha Romanoff cried out for a solo outing. From Iron Man 2 to Endgame, she was mostly just the Responsible Token Female of the ensemble, apart from the deeply odd (and therefore mostly unsuccessful) hint of star-crossed romance with Bruce Banner. Maria Hill, Lady Sif, and (at least until her baffling heel turn in CAatWS) Sharon Carter all seemed like less known, and therefore more intriguing, candidates for the franchise's first female solo outing - not counting TV's Agent Carter or Jessica Jones, of course. (And that's not even mentioning the excellent female characters of Agents of SHIELD!)

Unsurprisingly, therefore, Black Widow feels about as inessential as an MCU flick can get. There are two big problems here: one, the movie makes a big deal out of Natasha believing in her found Avengers family, even during their post-Civil War split period, but, when she discovers that the quasi-little sister she either thought was dead or willingly still part the Red Room program was in fact only recently freed from its clutches, which were even more restrictive than she knew, instead of feeling overwhelming sympathy for her, as well as guilt over not having sought her out sooner, she barely reacts to their reunion (which, for some reason, involves a badly edited fistfight). Problem Two is there's really no good story reason for Steve Rogers not to be in this flick - she enriched his last two solo outings, so why not have him return the favor? Showing the perpetual leader Cap voluntarily taking a backseat/supporting role to his good friend's personal mission could have been fascinating.

The Russian prison escape was also deeply odd - if Natasha is so concerned about civilian casualties now, why not stealthily extract Alexei Shostakov, rather than cause all kinds of violence and mayhem spectacularly busting him out? That said, once the adoptive family is reunited, the movie finally gets going, and while the flying/helicarrier aspect of the Red Room was completely unnecessary and OTT, it was also fun, and I'm a sucker for Unexpected Cavalry to the Rescue moments.

Ultimately, then, for all its faults, I quite enjoyed the flick - as far as solo women-starring superhero flicks go, it's definitely better than the middling Captain Marvel (the weakest of the MCU films so far), and much better than the entirely mediocre Wonder Woman 1. (Haven't seen Harley Quin...; don't plan to.) And while the post-credits stinger is perhaps the franchise's lamest, I do look forward to more of Florence Pugh's Yelena - ideally with more of Harbour and Weisz in tow, of course!

Grade: B
 
I thought for sure Steve Rogers was going to show up in the not-mid-credits scene where Nat gets the quinjet. She says she's off to bust some friends out of prison, but at the end of Civil War we see Steve doing this. It would have been cool if her arms dealer friend said something like "got you a jet ... and a friend" and the camera goes over to the jet, and there's Steve, giving her a little smile and a wave. That's all I wanted.
 
flaminio said:
I thought for sure Steve Rogers was going to show up in the not-mid-credits scene where Nat gets the quinjet. She says she's off to bust some friends out of prison, but at the end of Civil War we see Steve doing this. It would have been cool if her arms dealer friend said something like "got you a jet ... and a friend" and the camera goes over to the jet, and there's Steve, giving her a little smile and a wave. That's all I wanted.
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Here's Cate Shortland's quote about why no cameos from other Avengers were included:

"Initially, there was discussions about everything, about all of the different characters. What we decided was, and I think Kevin was really great, he said, ‘She doesn’t need the boys.’ We didn’t want it to feel like she needs the support. We want her to stand alone. And she does."
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www.indiewire.com

Kevin Feige Supported ‘Black Widow’ Excluding Big MCU Cameos: ‘She Doesn’t Need the Boys’

"We didn't want it to feel like she needs the support," director Cate Shortland said about nixing MCU cameos.
www.indiewire.com www.indiewire.com

To be honest, I think that's a pretty dumb way to think. Hawkeye showing up in "Thor" didn't mean Thor couldn't stand alone, Black Widow showing up in "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" didn't mean Cap couldn't stand alone, etc. To exclude characters when it would be more logical to include them (especially at the end, where excluding them creates a plot hole) isn't a smart decision.
 
Eh, given the timeline - Bruce in space, Bucky in Wakanda, and Sam, Scott, and Clint locked up - Steve was pretty much the only major in-story cameo/established supporting player possible, and Evans was already out IRL. So, who would that leave? Nick Fury/Maria Hill/Sharon Carter? Some Dora Milaje? Coulson's non-canonical Agents of SHIELD? Those would have been distractions. A bearded Cap showing up at the very end would have been cute, but mostly pointless.
 
Gaith said:
Eh, given the timeline - Bruce in space, Bucky in Wakanda, and Sam, Scott, and Clint locked up - Steve was pretty much the only major in-story cameo/established supporting player possible, and Evans was already out IRL. So, who would that leave? Nick Fury/Maria Hill/Sharon Carter? Some Dora Milaje? Coulson's non-canonical Agents of SHIELD? Those would have been distractions. A bearded Cap showing up at the very end would have been cute, but mostly pointless.
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The issue is that we see Black Widow waiting to be captured by General Ross, then we suddenly see her free weeks later, with no explanation of how she got away from Ross. It's a confusing plot hole.
 
We don't see her captured, we just see Ross and a bunch of agents pull up to her. It's possible she was able to escape/gave Ross info about the Red room and he let her go.
 
wilhelm scream said:
We don't see her captured, we just see Ross and a bunch of agents pull up to her. It's possible she was able to escape/gave Ross info about the Red room and he let her go.
Click to expand...

But why does the movie leave that up to speculation? Why not show it? It feels choppy as if something was cut out.
 
I don't think we need to see Nat escape from Ross and his goons; I think ending the film on a shot of her face with a confident "Here's another situation I gotta get out of" would have been fine. We don't need to actually see her beat up the goons; we've seen her do enough of that already.

The weird thing is that the movie doesn't end there -- it cuts to her meeting the arms guy and getting the jet, in what clearly feels like a mid-credits scene, but isn't. The film also doesn't have the fancy end credit sequence like most every other recent MCU film -- it goes straight to the white-on-black text scroll.

Seems like there might be material there ripe for a fan-fix...
 
Just started this. Not sure why they chose Smells Like Teen Spirit for the opener.
 
hbenthow said:
To be honest, I think that's a pretty dumb way to think. Hawkeye showing up in "Thor" didn't mean Thor couldn't stand alone, Black Widow showing up in "Captain America: The Winter Soldier" didn't mean Cap couldn't stand alone, etc. To exclude characters when it would be more logical to include them (especially at the end, where excluding them creates a plot hole) isn't a smart decision.
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ESPECIALLY when we finally get to see Black Widow do her thing solo, away from all the other players she's always supporting, and then they introduce a whole new group of people to surround her with. It actually really feels like they didn't think she could stand alone.

DigModiFicaTion said:
Just started this. Not sure why they chose Smells Like Teen Spirit for the opener.
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I f'n HATE this new trend where every movie has to have a new vastly-different cover of some iconic song in the trailer/opening. It feels like a completely transparent effort to both prey on nostalgia and get cool points. If it's something that completely fits the character/situation, that could be different (Sucker Punch may have started this, but it worked) but Smells LIke Teen Spirit here is an egregious example.
 
I have no interest in Black Widow, but I heard something about characters from it appearing in Hawkeye so I guess I'm gonna have to finally watch this crap.
 
This is the only one female-centered superhero movie which I consider to be good.
WW was rather mediocre and way overrated, Captain Marvel and WW84 were plain bad, but this was really enjoyable (didnt watch Birds of Prey and I do not intend to).
 
Birds of Prey is amazing, for what it's worth.
Gieferg said:
This is the only one female-centered superhero movie which I consider to be good.
WW was rather mediocre and way overrated, Captain Marvel and WW84 were plain bad, but this was really enjoyable (didnt watch Birds of Prey and I do not intend to).
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I've seen trailers (don't like what I've seen at all) and read reviews, also I'm not interested in anything centered on Harley Quinn. There is no reason for me to watch it.
 
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Not to sidetrack the thread too much, but I would rank the female-led superhero movies Birds of Prey, Wonder Woman, Black Widow, Captain Marvel, Wonder Woman 1984.
 
The Captain Marvel fanedit that finally released here is fantastic. It might change ya'lls minds about that ranking...
 
Gotta love different opinions. :) For me Captain Marvel and Wonder Woman are at the top and Black Widow is just ahead of 1984. I'm undecided on Birds of Prey, probably right in the middle. My reason is Black Widow and Wonder Woman 1984 came with expectations on my part, and they failed to meet them.
 
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