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Now that the spoiler ban has officially been lifted by the Russo brothers, we can finally talk about everything that happened in Avengers: Endgame.
And the first big thing we’re gonna talk about is….
Wait. If you haven’t watched Endgame just yet, we advise you to turn away now.
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Still with us? We’ll assume that you’re all caught up with Endgame before you continue. And if you haven’t, proceed at your own risk. You have been warned.
While the death of Tony Stark aka Iron Man left a deep hole in our hearts, we’re here to talk about Natasha Romanoff aka Black Widow.
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As Black Widow and Hawkeye literally fought each other to sacrifice their lives to gain the Soul Stone on Vormir, it was Natasha that ultimately won – or lost- that battle and saved trillions of lives in the process.
According to Endgame screenwriters, Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely, they “couldn’t be afraid to kill” Black Widow.
Speaking to the Los Angeles Times, Christopher defended the decision, “I understand she was a beloved character and none of us want our heroes to die. But that is the natural end of her journey and it is the story of apotheosis of who she is becoming.”
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“She started out as a very dark character,” Christopher continued. “Even before the movies begin, she’s a spy, she’s an assassin. She has red in her ledger and to take her all the way to that sacrifice point is where her character is headed. And to not let her do that seemed a disservice to her as a hero.”
“Right,” Stephen added. “We couldn’t be afraid to kill her simply because she was the most important and the first female character.”
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Directors, Joe and Anthony Russo, also believe that Black Widow ultimately beating Hawkeye to sacrifice herself to unlock the Soul Stone, works.
“It’s a fight to see who’s going to kill themselves,” Joe said to Entertainment Weekly. “It’s a crazy concept for a scene. And as you’ve seen in The Avengers, she’s a better fighter than he is. So when it comes down to a fight between the two of them, she wins.”
“To me, it’s one of the sadder scenes in the movie because it’s really putting two people in a Sophie’s choice, putting two people in the position where, do you let your friend die or do you die?” Joe continued. “The theme of the movie is, can you change your destiny, and what does it cost to do it? And are you willing to pay that cost?”
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Much criticism about Black Widow’s death surrounded the fact that there was no “proper funeral” for the spy-turned-superhero. Christopher and Stephen defended their decision to have not give Natasha an onscreen funeral.
“Tony gets a funeral. Natasha doesn’t,” Christopher said to the New York Times. “That’s partly because Tony’s this massive public figure and she’s been a cipher the whole time. It wasn’t necessarily honest to the character to give her a funeral.”
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As the goal of Endgame was to “just put these people on a journey or continue or end their journeys,” Stephen explained that Captain America and Iron Man too received equally fitting and definitive endings.
“Steve Rogers goes from selfless to slightly more self-interested. Tony goes from selfish to giving himself for the universe. Thor goes from obligated to letting go of the obligation. And Black Widow goes from a woman with red on her ledger to clearly wiping out all that red.”
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BRB, we’re still crying.
Do you think that Black Widow had a fitting end?
Info via Comic Book + Uproxx