Black Widow

Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson), AKA Black Widow, is forced to confront her past as a network of super killers with ties to her own origin is exposed. Now, it will take more than her own wit and strength to take down the mastermind behind the plan, Dreykov (Ray Winstone), it’ll take family, meaning, Red Guardian (David Harbour), Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh), and Melina Vostokoff (Rachel Weisz). Directed by Cate Shortland and Written by Eric Pearson, Jac Schaeffer and Ned Benson this clashing mix of Red Scare vs. Red White and Blue makes for an imbalanced mix of comedy and Marvel badassery, unclear in tonality and underserving as an origin story for one of the more interesting and enigmatic characters in the Marvel Universe. While action set pieces roll out as expected, which is notable, the plot driving dialogue on the other hand rolls out flat with sophomoric attempts at humor and poor Russian accent to boot, seriously, where were the dialect coaches on this one? Bottom line at two hours and 14 minutes of runtime, one would have really hoped for a significantly more substantial amount of detail as to Natasha’s beguiling and wily ways, she, Black Widow, deserves better, which ironically can also be said for the release and pay scheme Disney has put into effect for the Star and Executive producer behind the project itself, tsk tsk. Black Widow is rated PG-13.