10 Problems With Marvel's Phase 4 (And How To Solve Them)

After months and months of the usual Mafia-level secrecy, Disney and Marvel Studios unveiled what Phase 4 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe looks like at this relatively early stage: the projects that will become the next slate of films in a shared universe that’s made $22 billion worldwide over the last eleven years.

And it wasn’t terribly overwhelming. True, the response in Hall H was predictably manic, but at this point Kevin Feige could probably reveal a Rocket Raccoon movie starring an actual raccoon and people would go insane.

The fact is, the vast majority of the projects revealed to us had already been revealed or leaked over the preceding months anyway. The only surprises were the subtitles of some of the films, the casting of Shang-Chi and a few of the Eternals, the revelation of Natalie Portman’s role in the next Thor film, and the last minute, post-credits-style stinger of Mahershala Ali’s casting in a Phase 5 Blade reboot.

It’s not just the predictability of Feige’s presentation, though. There are some issues raised by what we know so far about Marvel’s Phase 4 offering. But it’s not too late to fix them… oh, and spoilers for any and all of the Marvel movies released so far may appear in this article like wild Pokemon. Gotta catch ‘em all.

We now know a little more about the first instalment in Marvel’s Phase 4: the Black Widow movie. Set between Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War during the period where Natasha Romanoff was still a fugitive from international justice, it’ll see her face off against former colleagues from Russia and the Red Room.

And yet there’s nothing here that feels especially vital. Unless you’re a Black Widow stan desperate for one last round of high kicks and dry quips, it all just seems a little dull.

The Black Widow movie must have been greenlit after they knew the character would die in Avengers: Endgame. They knew that her character’s arc was coming to a close: so why spend all the time and money on this film in the first place?

Natasha Romanoff is dead: this prequel, the beginning of the vaunted new saga, is set during the saga we’ve just closed the book on. What is there to get invested in?

Well, the obvious answer would be to walk back Endgame’s definitive no-taking-back rule on the Widow’s passing.

In the comics, the Black Widow was killed in battle and resurrected… by the Red Room. They have her memories transferred to a clone artificially grown to maturity, their greatest assassin returned to them at last.

It was made as clear as possible that the Infinity Stones couldn’t bring back a character sacrificed to the Soul Stone - but they found a loophole to bring back Gamora. Why not Romanoff?