Black Widow
Runtime: 2 hours 13 minutes
Rating: PG
Genre: Action, Sci-Fi, Adventure
Summary:
Black Widow is the origin story of Natasha Romanoff, or Black Widow. After her father completes a mission on US soil, the family of four, composed of Alexei, the father, Melina, the mother, Natasha, and Yelena, the younger sister, flee the country on a plane. After arriving at their destination, Melina is rushed off due to her injuries, and Natasha and Yelena are split up. Years later and after the events of Civil War, Natasha meets Yelena once again and the two are on a mission to stop the Red Room.
Characters:
Our four main characters make up a wonderful little family. Natasha, Black Widow, is the most well-known member of the crew. She’s reserved, powerful, and determine to try and help her sister. Yelena is Natasha’s sister with a deeper history as a Widow. Due to her prolonged experience, Yelena is rougher around the edges, more ruthless, but also more charismatic. Her attitude in a lot of scenarios is hilarious. Melina is the girls’ mother and a clever woman. She is always a couple moves ahead of the back guys. Last but not least we have Alexie, The Red Guardian. He is caring, strong, and pretty funny, but he is also what you would call an airhead from time to time.
Sebastian: 9.4/10
Review:
After waiting a year and a half for a new MCU film, it finally arrived with Black Widow and I must say it didn’t disappoint. Black Widow has deserved a film for years and I thought her solo outing was an awesome addition to the franchise with some cool action scenes and some great new characters introduced. The time frame within the MCU was a perfect setting for the film as it filled in the gaps between films and I felt they did a great job establishing when it took place. I really liked seeing Nat on the run because it fits her character and it sets the tense tone of the film. The characters were all fantastic but especially the main four. Scarlett Johansson is once again amazing as Natasha Romanoff and you can tell she knows this role so well and she is this character. I liked the emotional journey she takes in this film and her connection to the other. Yelena Belova, played by Florence Pugh is a great addition and you can tell there are future plans for her. She is really funny and her action scenes are awesome. Her sarcasm throughout is a good pairing with Nat and while they are similar they’re different and the way they bounce off each other works so well. David Harbour, as Red Guardian is hilarious and he provides a majority of the comedy while having some cool action as well. The story is really interesting and I like exploring more of Natasha’s past as it is important for the finality of her character. Her backstory has always been a question mark and I like how almost all the hints they have mentioned up until now are all explained here. The action is superb and I like the hand to hand more spy-like fights we get in this as it is different from the alien fights of recent films. I didn’t have any big issues with this film and while it might not be my new favourite it’s still a great ride.
All in all, this was a great dive back into the MCU and a film that I felt was worthy of Black Widow. I definitely enjoyed it and want to see it again and will also recommend any MCU fan to check it out!
Favourite Moment (Spoilers):
When Natasha and Yelena break out Alexei because I thought it was a good mix of some really cool action and some really funny moments. I thought that Natasha and Yelena arguing felt very natural and it worked for me.
Austin: 9.2/10
Review:
We are back in black! 737 days later, an MCU movie has hit the big screen. Black Widow is the first movie in Phase 4 and it starts the Phase really well. After Avengers: Endgame, (SPOILERS RIGHT NOW) Scarlett Johansen didn’t get the send-off she deserved playing a major role in the MCU for years. This movie opened the door for that to happen. Our characters are so great in their own roles, especially the new characters we meet in Black Widow. Yelena is so well written, and her dynamic with Natasha is incredible. By the end of the movie, it feels like we’ve known them for a long time, and not just this movie. The situation irony and little quips go a long way towards keeping the movie light enough during some super tense action scenes. I hope we get to see The Red Guardian again just because he’s so clueless with some good intentions. I don’t think he’s actually a good dude, but he’s pretty funny and David Harbour did a great job with the character.
The plot of this movie is a little bit of a rollercoaster. It starts out hot and heavy, moving really quickly with the tension cranked up to 9. Then we slow down a bit, which I thought was the right decision, but for a good portion of the movie, we lost a little bit of the plot intensity. The slow pacing was fine, but I didn’t love that I was wondering where this movie was going about halfway through. We close the door on that quite well in the last 30 minutes, but it’s a bit of a dark spot halfway through.
I love Marvel, and this movie is pretty darn good. Seeing Black Widow one more time and finally giving her the backstory that has been much needed for a long time was awesome. One end credit scene here that does a good job of setting up a couple things and connecting back into one of our MCU Tv Shows.
Favourite Moment (Spoilers):
My favourite moment has to be when they are driving away from Taskmaster and the Widows, and Yelena kicks the door off. It gets ripped off by a sign and then takes out the Widow following them. The look of “Damn, I just did that, yea I’m cool” was hilarious and it was a pretty sick action scene too.
Nathanyal: 9.1/10
Review:
Black Widow was my first Marvel movie that I watched in theatres where I knew the whole story of the MCU. For those who follow our YouTube channel, Prairie Grown Reviews, you will know that we made a video series discussing the three phases of the MCU, which was my introduction into the whole world, instead of bits and pieces of it. I have to say, Black Widow was an interesting movie to me. It definitely had some great and unexpected areas, but some other areas were not done as well.
So, to start, I have to say that the pacing was really weird to me. The movie starts off with a high action, high tension scene with car chases and airplanes. And immediately following that, the movie hits the brakes hard. Everything after that seems slow. Although that part of the movie was spent filling in the holes for the movies around it, it still didn’t feel all that enjoyable. There are definitely ways to make those areas more entertaining or captivating.
My only gripe was really the pacing. There were instances where everything moved slow, and I almost fell asleep. On the other hand, there were areas that shocked me. For one, the characters were amazing. The core group had some stiff interactions in the intro, but after they meet again, they had nice chemistry. They acted almost like a real family. I especially enjoyed the dynamic of Natasha and Yelena. The sarcastic nature of Yelena fits and contrasts well with Natasha’s seriousness. There was also some surprisingly great comedy as well. Yelena had amazing one-liners, and some of the situations were funnier than what I expected. Finally, I enjoyed learning about Natasha’s backstory and seeing how everything fits within the universe. Watching loose ends get tied and some new connections being made was entertaining. It impresses me how this whole universe works together.
Overall, this was a solid movie. Besides some slow moments, the characters and lore will keep you hooked. With some great interactions and some high tension action, this is a movie you don’t want to miss.
Favourite Moment (Spoilers):
My favourite moment in the movie was the reveal of Melina meeting with Dreykov was actually Natasha. That whole exchange and the plan caught me off guard and it wasn’t what I was expecting. It also led to some great dialogue and a nice action scene.
