290.
Black Widow
8.5/10
Covid has hit cinemas and movies hard with delays galore to the big hitters that were expected on the screen. A prime example of this would be Black Widow. Scarlett Johansson is reprising her role after her fate from Avengers: Endgame to give us an origin story and a movie based after Civil War and before Avengers: Infinity War. A bit of a star-studded cast come together for this one as Johanson is joined on screen by Rachel Weisz, Florence Pugh, David Harbour and Ray Winstone. The movie came out in the cinema as well as releasing on Disney+ at the same time, which is a little strange in my book. Although you did have to pay extra on the streaming service to watch the movie. Johansson raised a lawsuit regarding this as she believed it hindered people heading to the cinema and cut how much money she was going to receive as a bonus. This has since been settled for a decent wedge of money. Let's get into the movie and see what past Natasha Romanov has to deal with.
The movie begins in 1995 in Ohio where Alexei, played by Harbour and Black Widow Melana, played by Weisz, have set up a Russian undercover operation posing as parents of Natasha and Yelena.
They steal S.H.I.E.L.D. intel and escape to Cuba to meet their boss Dreykov, played by Winstone. The two young girls are drugged and taken away to the Red Room for training whilst they witness their 'mother' being taken away as she was shot during their escape. The next few years are shown in a montage for the opening credits along with a great rendition of Nirvana's 'Smells Like Teen Spirit'.
The main segment of the movie starts with Natasha as we recognise her, staring into a mirror with a look of regret. It's 2016 and she is on the run and leaves a decoy trail for Thaddeus Ross to find as she is now in Norway. Alexei is in jail in the middle of nowhere and Yelena is now a Widow herself. We are sent to her scene as she has a sniper on a rooftop, keeping an eye on a defected widow before chasing her through the streets and stabbing her. Just as the blade enters, the older widow releases a red gas in Yelena's face which seems to wake her senses. She realises that she has her free will back and digs a tracker out of her leg after being instructed to release the other widows. She sends the remaining vials of gas to Natasha, hoping the Avengers can release the other women. Natasha is driving around Norway, unknowingly that within her mail are the vials. She is targeted by a henchman from the Red Room and a character that we knew was going to be in the movie, Taskmaster. Now my knowledge of Taskmaster is quite low and only comes from the Spiderman computer games. He is a character that focuses on his enemies and mimics their every move to beat them in combat. Well, this time Taskmaster blows Natasha's car up and incapacitates her whilst trying to get the vials. Natasha finally twigs that it's not her that Taskmaster wants, steals the vials herself and get booted off the bridge. She realises that the mail came from Budapest and there is an old picture of her and Yelena attached to them. Budapest will be the next stop.
In Budapest, Nastash arrives at her old safe house from her and Clint Barton's 'Budapest' mission that we hear so much of. The two sisters start a fight after not seeing each other for years. Before having to team up as the Red Room move in on them. Yelena sent the vials out so that they wouldn't be grabbed by the Soviets but they have found their way back to her displeasure. They manage to escape several widows and the Taskmaster again whilst Natasha also witnesses how the Widows are treated as one break their legs and is forced into suicide by Dreykov. As they hide, we also find out a little history of the 'Budapest' job. Natasha had planted bombs within Dreykov's building and used his daughter as collateral in the explosion, presuming she had killed them both. Yelena corrects her as she knows Dreykov is still alive.
He leads them to Melina, who played the girl's mother and they are shocked to find out she is alive and still working for the Red Room. She is running a farm just in the wilderness of Russia and using mind control on pigs, which will be used on the Widows in good time. They try to convince her to reveal where the Red Room is, as the Widows are always drugged on the journey. Melina has already alerted the Red Room though and the lads are on the way. They are taken down and moved up to the Red Room which is floating in the clouds using huge turbine engines.
Within the Red Room, Alexei and Natasha are locked up whilst Yelena is strapped down for dissection and a little look into how the gas works to stop the control of her mind. In Dreykov's office, Melina is in combat gear and sits with Dreykov as Taskmaster looks on. All is not as it seems though as Dreykov recognises the eyes and knows it's Natasha. He takes off her disguise and asks Taskmaster not to interfere as questions are asked. We then get a flashback as Melina and Natasha come up with the plan and Melina, in the cells, frees herself and Alexei before heading onto her plan of bringing down the engines. Back in the office, Natasha tries to shoot Dreykov but can't pull the trigger. Taunting her about the history of her mother, he lets her try her knife but again cannot bring herself to end the attack. It's all down to the fact that there are pheromones in the air which, when inhaled, stop any attempt on Dreykov's life. He orders Taskmaster to take off their helmet and it's revealed that it is actually his daughter. Little twist there for the audience and Natasha. Now it's time for Dreykov to reveal his plan of world domination from the shadows and once he is done, Natasha gives a thank you and smashes her head into the table. Strange but clever. We get another flashback to a discussion with Melina who reveals about the pheromones and she is now breaking her own nose to stop the cycle through her body. She can then attack him, sneakily stealing his ring to have access to the desk that controls all of the widows and their missions, downloading all the information ready to send to S.H.I.E.L.D. and now it's time to escape. Unfortunately, Dreykov has alerted the remaining widows on board. Putting up a good fight as the station goes down under its own weight, Natasha is saved by a returning Yelena who had escaped her own problems. She throws the remaining vials above the fight and the widows finally become self-aware.
Now the race is on to escape before the station hits the ground. Melina and Alexei have an aircraft but so does Dreykov and his men. Yelena isn't ready to let him escape and throws her weapon into the engine of his craft, willing to sacrifice herself in the explosion. Somehow she comes out unscathed but falls unconscious through the clouds. Natasha follows her with a parachute and attaches it to her back just in time as Taskmaster is flying in their direction. Tangling together, Natasha and Taskmaster hit the deck for one last battle and Natasha manages to wrestle the helmet off and find another vial casually laying about, finally releasing the girl from her father's orders. In the distance, we see Ross and many agents travelling to arrest Natasha and her family, with them ready to stand together. Natasha isn't ready for this and as the remaining Widows land a craft, the family embrace before seeing their final goodbyes, unknown to them. They also take Taskmaster, with no one left behind.
The movie ends with Natasha finally getting her hands on the Quinjet, now with a new haircut, the one we see in Infinity War, she is ready to break her friends out of prison. There is also a post-credit scene, which takes place later, after the events of Endgame. Yelena is at Natasha grave, giving their childhood whistle and remembering her sister. Valentina Allegra de Fontaine steps beside her and Yelena isn't impressed. We have already seen Valentina in The Falcon and The Winter Soldier as she recruits the 'Wish' version of Captain America. She gives Yelena a new assignment, one to kill the killer of her sister. The picture she gets handed is of Clint Barton and I can imagine this is gearing up for possible involvement in the new TV series on Disney+. I wonder if she will listen to the truth.
I really enjoyed this movie a lot more than I thought I would. I'm not sure if that is because I went in thinking that this movie wasn't needed and it was nothing more than a money-spinner but the fact that it didn't feel too much like an MCU movie helped. From the first credits, there seemed to be a darker undertone to the movie and it felt more like an espionage movie than a superhero one, which again was a pleasant surprise. There'll be plenty of MCU fanboys out there who will put this near the bottom of their list because it doesn't come with the Disney sparkles and fancy happiness and I'm more than fine with that, each to their own. At least this isn't a rehash of the Lion King like Black Panther is or ending up with some poor sequels that Iron Man decided to get into. This storyline was very well constructed, answered some outstanding references from earlier Marvel movies and to some extent, gave closure to Natasha's story as a whole.
We know exactly what we get with Scarlett as Black Widow so there isn't too much extra to explain. We got some of the usual sassiness, we got serious and we got some great action scenes. For me, the stand out has to be the performance from Florence Pugh. Yelena was instantly represented as Natasha's sister. Her sassy personality but also a little more damaged. The humour was mostly carried from Yelena but because she was an Eastern European character, the seriousness that came with the jokes only made the scenes a lot more enjoyable. We then see the ultrahard exterior break and once again Pugh carries the role with the top draw quality that I had seen whilst watching 'Fighting with My Family'. I'm looking forward to seeing her reprise the role. Even is the accent was a little sketchy. Thankfully though, the accent wasn't anywhere near as bad as Ray Winstone's portrayal. Dreykov was an interesting fellow and Winstone knows how to play a tough guy but the accent was a little out of reach for him, especially when required to shout as his English accent was slipping back into play. Back to the good side though and the rest of the family played by Harbour and Weisz were very much needed. Their characters each had their own draws and definitely shared the limelight along with the sister. Some very good casting from all involved.
I not only went back to the cinema to have a rewatch but once it came within the package of Disney+, it was on my screen at home. The Steelbook sits on the self with the rest of the MCU and I couldn't be happier. This will forever be a moment that I can happily admit I was wrong in wondering if this movie was going to be a waste of time. Was it needed for the MCU storyline, probably not, just the after-credits helped with that. This feels like a one-off, closure on a character that has been around from near enough day one and a final farewell that was deserved, rather than a splat at the bottom of a cliff. I've said it once and I'm happy to say it again but the fact that this didn't feel overwhelmingly like an MCU movie helped. I found myself singing Nirvana for a couple of days after thanks to the intro to this movie and I'll end up doing the same when I end to catching it again sometime... and now I'm humming it again!
