'Black Widow' Footage Looks Like a 'Bourne' Movie at Marvel Studios Panel

Natasha Romanoff had red in her ledger when, even as she sacrificed herself to save the universe in Avengers: Endgame, and in the upcoming Black Widow, we’re going to get a closer look at why.

On Saturday evening, Marvel Studios took over Hall H of San Diego Comic-Con to deliver information about the next half-decade of Marvel films, and the next one to come out will be Black Widow, a spy thriller about the character Scarlett Johansson has played since Iron Man 2.

During the panel, Marvel aired a teaser trailer for the film featuring plenty of spy action and confirmed that Taskmaster will be the principal villain. The story is set in Budapest and it at least partially takes place after the events of Captain America: Civil War.

“We saw some footage where Scarlett Johansson’s Nat grapples with Florence Pugh’s Yelena in a fight that’s part John Wick, part Killing Eve, and 100% brutal,” Entertainment Weekly*’s Devan Coggan said of the clip shown during the panel. Many others compared it to a Bourne movie.

Helmed by Australian director Cate Shortland, Black Widow also stars David Harbour is Alexi, Rachel Weisz as Malena, O-T Fagbenle as Mason, and Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova, the character that takes on the Black Widow mantle after Romanoff in the comics. During the panel, Pugh called Yelena a “sister figure to Natasha.” Fagbenle noted a potentially one-sided “romantic undercurrent” directed at Natasha from Mason.

“I get to play Natasha as a fully realized woman, in all of her many facets,” Johansson said. “I’m excited for fans to see what she perceives to be the flawed side of her, and I’m looking to wipe out some of that red in my ledger.”

We know based on Nat’s final conversation with Hawkeye during Avengers: Endgame that wiping the red out of her ledge was a lifelong struggle for the super-spy, but we might see her make great strides in doing this during Black Widow.

Black Widow will be released May 1, 2020.