Fuck Yeah, Black Widow

This isn't a baiting question; but these for some reason people assume that Natasha, and Clint, both sleep around. That's easily disproven, but I was wondering if whether or not YOU believe they have ever been ~intimate~ with one another. If they have, whatever; it's not really our business, is it? I wonder though, because if you look back at the period where they WERE involved it almost reads like Natasha seduced him, promising her goodies once they killed Iron Man. That never happened, so...

Fri, 17 May 2013 18:09:37 -0700

Yeah, I assume they’ve slept together, given they were involved for, idk, five years our time. I’m not sure where this comes from, other than the totally understandable “comics are hard”, but I see a lot of people assuming that Clint and Natasha’s romance only lasted for those four Tales of Suspense issues. But the plotline carried on into the Avengers, which, for me, is where things actually got interesting, and they didn’t break up until Avengers #76. (For some context, Clint joins the team in Avengers #16.)

I mean, all the usual caveats apply: as Silver Age characters, Clint and Natasha went from zero to true love in the space of like, five panels, and that true love was mostly comprised of chaste touching, melodramatic glances, and monologuing. Clint’s out-of-costume persona also wasn’t particularly developed— he didn’t have a first name until Avengers #63! But given the length and depth of their relationship, the fact that they were talking about marriage at one point, and what we’ve learned about the characters since 1968, I think it’s pretty reasonable to assume they’ve slept together, regardless of whether or not they “sleep around.”

FWIW, in Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes II, sort of a modern retelling of that era of Avengers comics, Clint and Natasha are share a room with a single bed and fight in their underwear:

I don’t really take this series as continuity gospel but it’s a corollary at the least!

And the hours pass, and the Widow bites again. And again. And...

Fri, 17 May 2013 16:45:11 -0700

And the hours pass, and the Widow bites again. And again. And again. The odds had been a hundred-to-one against her when she started. Now they are seven-to-one.
Little Man: Stop her! Stop her! She’s only a lousy woman…
Three-to-one.
Natasha: Wrong, little man. I am the Black Widow…
One-to-one.
Natasha: …and that’s more than enough to handle the likes of you.

Game, set, match.

Yeah, Natasha just took out literally a hundred guys. But I think this whole sequence works because it doesn’t make her invulnerable. We see her get captured at the beginning of the story, and spoilers: she needs Ben’s help to take down the last remaining bad guy. Natasha can’t fight them off by brute force, she has to use every scrap of cunning, she has to devise ways to corner them in small groups, she has to disappear when it’s convenient. Her weapons run out of gas, she has to make every shot count. But it all works because of that, because she’s taxed to the brink, because you need to be to make impossible odds count.

In short this is basically how Natasha should always be written. Not necessarily fighting off a hundred goons!! But her vulnerability should help reveal her strength, not someone else’s.

From Marvel Two-in-One #10, by Chris Claremont and Bob Brown.

The Widow runs in the shadows now, moving thru the vast complex...

Fri, 17 May 2013 15:30:22 -0700

The Widow runs in the shadows now, moving thru the vast complex like some eldritch wraith, and when she’s seen— it’s only when she wants to be. And when she strikes, it is without warning… and without mercy.

I’m not going to post the whole issue, here, but just rest assured there are a few straight pages of Black Widow being badass narrated with in florid Claremontese. I love how smart she fights in this whole sequence, not just these panels: using stealth and her surroundings, only going hand to hand when she needs to. There’s something very cerebral in her approach, ruthless and true to character.

From Marvel Two-in-One #10, by Chris Claremont and Bob Brown.

Natasha: I can do it. In a flash, the Widow’s moving,...

Fri, 17 May 2013 14:15:10 -0700

Natasha: I can do it.
In a flash, the Widow’s moving, scrambling up the gantry towerwith a grace and ease that would have shamed Olga Korbut… remembering suddenly, absurdly, that she’d once told a man she loved that the Black Widow used to be thebest spy in the world… the best! Now was her chance to prove it.

Natasha: You know I used to be the most dangerous spy in the world, Matt? Men used to tremble at my name. I didn’t like myself much back then. Then I met Hawkeye, helped the Avengers, joined SHIELD, and did a few other noble things. I liked myself better. Then I met you. Didn’t you see it happening? The liberated lady you fell in love with became your— sidekick. I used to be so darn strong, Matt—and I feel it slipping away from me.

There was actually a time when I think Matt was good for Natasha, when he offered her something she needed— a fresh start, no judgements, action and adventure and chance to do good. I can see why she fell for him, why she needed to remind herself she could love somebody and not have it all fall apart. When Conway moved her and Matt to San Francisco together, it was an era of comics that if not good were at least interesting— comics that let Natasha be heroic, compassionate, and vibrant.

Then Conway left the title and was replaced with Steve Gerber.

Gerber didn’t want to write Natasha. He liked Matt best as a loner, and so he kept coming up with increasingly humiliating ways to write her out. Natasha couldn’t find a job, became homeless, was sidelined for a whole parade of new and otherworldly women for Matt to flirt with. A running storyline, then, was Natasha’s jealousy. When Gerber wrote an earlier issue of Marvel Two-in-One (#3, starring Daredevil), Natasha appeared as a brainwashed goon for Matt to angst over. In his final humiliation, Natasha was literally wedded to a misogynist mutant ape. (For some reason, this last story was included in the recent Women of Marvel omnibus, and is why I refuse to buy a product that otherwise really gets me.) It was the nadir of Natasha, made worse by the fact that she was still, technically, co-headlining the book.

Anyway, I’m not the only one who noticed how terribly Natasha was treated under Gerber. Tony Isabella, the next Daredevil writer, immediately set out to do some rehab, letting Natasha address her diminishment and react to it. By referencing this scene in particular, Claremont is voicing his intentions, too: he wants to showcase Natasha, to show why she’s still the best in the world, and nobody’s sidekick. This isn’t as overt as his famous response to Avengers #200, but I absolutely believe this story is Claremont’s in-continuity middle finger to Natasha’s awful mishandling in the pages of Daredevil, and the way the superhero parts of women are too often reduced.

From Marvel Two-in-One #10, by Chris Claremont and Bob Brown, and Daredevil #120, by Tony Isabella and Bob Brown.

Ben: I got it! But having the bomb is a far cry from holding...

Thu, 16 May 2013 16:45:27 -0700

Ben: I got it!
But having the bomb is a far cry from holding it…
Ben: My hands… friction… burning ‘em! Can’t…hold on…the pain!
And yet hold he does.
Goon: Kill the fool— Agamemnon commands it!
Natasha: And the Black Widow says no!!

This sets up the major damage for the issue. Ben has to rope up this giant bomb, a tremendous feat of strength, endurance, and will. And Natasha has to help him by fighting off all the goons single-handed. Teamwork!

Mostly though: Natasha used to refer to herself in the third person, with an article. Like a supervillain. And I love it.

From Marvel Two-in-One #10, by Chris Claremont and Bob Brown.

Ben: Now we’re talkin’widder, I… uh, what d’ya...

Thu, 16 May 2013 15:30:27 -0700

Ben: Now we’re talkin’widder, I… uh, what d’ya think yer doin’?
Natasha: Getting us out of here,of course. Could you peel the body mold off my back, please?
Ben: Huh?
Natasha: The first thing a good agent learns is never go on a sticky job without a gimmick— in this case, a surprise package Ivan worked up from SHIELD stores.
Ben: Wow.
Natasha: Voilà! One organic body mold containing organic weaponry… completely undetectable from even the most sophisticated sensors. the modules fit together like so— forming a small, but efficient, field disruptor rifle. The only drawback is, you have about ten seconds to break thru that door before this toy overloads and fries me to a crisp. Can you do it?

Okay, so this is the origin of the weird false-back that appeared more famously in Marvel Fanfare. This is a bit to “wat” for me, and I’d really like it if Natasha had secret weapons that didn’t force her to disrobe. Still, there’s a remarkable lack of cheesecakery in this panel sequence, and I do appreciate Natasha’s no-nonsense approach.

Even if this gadget is too comic book for its own good, I do wish Natasha would use more crazy gadgetry in general. It seems like such an obvious overlap between the superhero and spy genres. Claremont tried to make Ivan a sort of Q, which is one of the few actual good uses of Ivan Marvel ever came up with. But now that he’s gone, that’s an easy hook for a new character, right?

On the subject of teamwork, note the symmetry here: Ben can’t knock down the force field without Natasha’s gizmo-rifle, but Natasha can’t knock down the door without Ben’s super strength. They’re both contributing in meaningful ways to their mutual escape, even if I’m cutting some of Ben’s panels off.

From Marvel Two-in-One #10, by Chris Claremont and Bob Brown.

Ben: Ya hear me, Aggie—I’m not gonna let yaaaaa...

Thu, 16 May 2013 14:15:52 -0700

Ben: Ya hear me, Aggie—I’m not gonna let yaaaaa szzrack!
Natasha: A nice try, Mr. Grimm. But as long as that force field stays up, neither of us is going anywhere.
Ben: At least I’m tryin’, lady, which is a lot more’n I can say for you!— Even if Aggie did take away them stringers o’ yours! What’s with you, Widder? Aggie talked like you an’ him wuz old frineds or sumthin’…
Natasha: Back off, Grimm! We were— I knew Agamemnon as… Andrei Rostov— a long, long time ago. He’s changed a lot since then. Still… I agree with you, it’s time we made our move.

So Ben and Natasha get captured and brought to the evil floating fortress of Natasha’s college ex!! Who was apparently a classics major very determined to use his degree in the real world.

The introduction of Andrei Rostov brought Natasha’s Total Love Interest number up to 4. While I do think the early stories (and the later ones…) have trouble thinking up ways to connect to Natasha’s backstory beyond lovers and would-be lovers, Natasha’s romantic life only became tricky to sort out when decades of continuity and rehashed plotlines piled on top of it. You know, like any comic character. (lol black widow is such a slut she sleeps with everyone lol)

I’m not really a fan of Bob Brown’s pencilling, but I can’t deny he draws a killer eyebrow. That’s a great stinkeye she gives Ben in the middle bottom panel.

From Marvel Two-in-One #10, by Chris Claremont and Bob Brown.

Natasha: Lord, no! That couple— they’re in my way! And I...

Thu, 16 May 2013 13:08:27 -0700

Natasha: Lord, no! That couple— they’re in my way! And I can’t swerve around them— the trees are too thick.
In desperation, Natasha hits the wheel and clutch together, the car slewing into a tight, sickening curve… but there’s so little room.
Alicia: Beeennn!
Ben: Gotta throw Alicia outa the way! Gotta—
Too little room!

Marvel Two-In-One is the Ben Grimm Team Up Power Hour, so that’s why Natasha crashes her car into him. (Next time I crash my car, I’m totally going to yell out “I’m crashing my car!” while I do it.)

From Marvel Two-In-One #10, by Chris Claremont and Bob Brown.

It’s madness— one moment, Central Park Drive is calm,...

Thu, 16 May 2013 12:58:45 -0700

It’s madness— one moment, Central Park Drive is calm, peaceful, thick with pedestrians and weekend cyclists…the next, it’s a mass of snarling engines and flying lead, peoplescreaming in terror as they scramble to get out of the way. Some don’t make it. A little fact which does not go unnoticed by…
Natasha: The police! Moving to cut me off! But I can’t be stopped! I won’t be stopped, not now, not when I’m this close…
A twist of the wheel and the tiny sports car is off the drive and tearing across the sheep meadow, dodging trees and picknickers with equal ease… and thru it all, Madame Natasha Romanoff is as cool as ice. She has to be. Because there’s nothing pretty about the world the Black Widow lives in, a brutal, merciless world where the innocent die as easily as the guilty. It’s a fact of life. You learn to live with it— or you die yourself.

Actually, I decided to post some Two-in-One #10 to celebrate it finally being collected. (Since y’all should know why it’s nifty.) In the early 1970s, after Natasha was spun off into her own feature and then later co-headlined Daredevil, she was quite divorced from her 1960s incarnation as a Soviet agent. She said, in the way that comic books say things, loudly but to herself, that she needed to start from scratch, and she dealt with street crime, not the SHIELD stuff or the Avengers post-makeover. (“Considering the hot water Natasha’s been getting herself into,” quoth one editor, “we doubt whether Col. Fury would want to take the chance of having her work undercover for him.”) Little by little, though, the espionage elements creeped their way back in.

Chris Claremont always tried to remind the reader of Natasha’s exotic past. When he got to decide her status quo a few years later, he brought her back to SHIELD. In this issue, and in his Daredevil guest stints, he infodumps to give Natasha steel.

And also a badass car chase right through Central Park. Cheese it, fellas, it’s the fuzz.

From Marvel Two-In-One #3 by Chris Claremont and Bob Brown.

Not so much in this month’s solicits for Natasha (sadface...

Thu, 16 May 2013 11:52:50 -0700

Not so much in this month’s solicits for Natasha (sadface emote), but this new volume collects Marvel Two-in-One #10, which is a great early Claremont Natasha feature.

Written by STEVE GERBER with LEN WEIN, MIKE FRIEDRICH & CHRIS CLAREMONT
Penciled by SAL BUSCEMA with JIM STARLIN, GIL KANE, GEORGE TUSKA, HERB TRIMPE & BOB BROWN
Cover by JIM STARLIN
Two hundred volumes long and still going strong, the MARVEL MASTERWORKS celebrate Vol. 200 with the launch of Marvel Two-In-One! Yes, the ever lovin’, blue-eyed Thing’s own series collected is between hard covers at last! Begun as a MARVEL FEATURE tryout, Ben Grimm’s headlining effort kicked off with Hulk and Iron Man battles (not to mention Thanos and the Blood Brothers), and then shifted into high gear with monster vs. monster — yup, it’s Thing vs. Man-Thing! Rounding out the first ten issues are the revival of the Guardians of the Galaxy; revelations in the life of the Valkyrie; and adventures with Daredevil, Sub-Mariner, Ghost Rider, Thor and Black Widow — and before you know it, you’ll be clamoring for more! Ya ain’t a Yancy Streeter, are ya? Collecting MARVEL FEATURE (1971) #11-12 and MARVEL TWO-IN-ONE (1974) #1-10.

Rumormongering

Sun, 12 May 2013 14:33:20 -0700

mushroom2703: Now that Winter Soldier is about gone, can we look forward to any new espionage titles to keep that corner of the MU fleshed out alongside Secret Avengers?
Alonso: Count on it, mushroom2703!
FYBW, forever the optimist: Thinks this might be the rumored Black Widow title.

"Unlike the heroines of the previous 20 years, Black Widow was a thrill seeker who chose the life of..."

Sat, 04 May 2013 12:40:00 -0700

“Unlike the heroines of the previous 20 years, Black Widow was a thrill seeker who chose the life of a crime fighter for the excitement it brought her. She didn’t do it to aid a boyfriend, she didn’t hide being a wallflower alter ego, and lived her life with a freedom usually reserved for men. In keeping with the issue-conscious 70’s, she descended from her penthouse to battle loan sharks and came to the aid of Puerto Rican youth groups… Black Widow was unquestionably sexy, but, as with everything else in her life, it was on her terms. Still, the liberated heroine had doubts. “Is there really a place for her in a world such as this?” Black Widow thinks in 1970, of the newly independent persona she has created for herself.”

- Mike Madrid, The Supergirls: Fashion, feminism, fantasy, and the history of comic book heroines

Jan: Okay, it’s a biplane. Do you know how to fly a...

Fri, 03 May 2013 18:16:01 -0700

Jan: Okay, it’s a biplane. Do you know how to fly a biplane? Wait… don’t answer. Of course you do. You speak every language. You fly every plane.
Natasha: It is all just information. Easy to control. Hold tightly, if you please. We are going to have trouble.

From Black Widow and the Marvel Girls #2, by Paul Tobin and Jacopo Camagni.

I stared at the map in wonder— I’d never come so close to...

Fri, 03 May 2013 00:25:54 -0700

I stared at the map in wonder— I’d never come so close to actual espionage before— he tried to kiss me, then— I had to push him away.
Natasha: Don’t— don’t ever do that again. Don’t ever touch me.
Danny: Sure, sister. Some other time— another place.
He was still laughing when I heard the sound— a sudden footstep.
Danny: Blast it! The guard!
Danny swung the flashlight beam in a cutting arc— the light struck the man in the face, blinding him. He was a tall man, beefy! I noticed that his uniform was not that of your government— and then I attacked! I was in a rage over Danny’s casual treatment of me— I’m afraid I wasn’t gentle.

From Daredevil #90, by Gerry Conway and Gene Colan.

"But Natasha is the only one who mines her own vulnerability. She’s the only one who makes it into a..."

Thu, 02 May 2013 08:22:40 -0700

“But Natasha is the only one who mines her own vulnerability. She’s the only one who makes it into a performance. And there’s something radical in acknowledging that feminine vulnerability as a performative, as something fake we are taught to expect and to mimic. That can be our superpower. We can be strong in ways men never will be because we face bullshit they will never have to face. That’s not justice, but it is power. It is strength. It’s control.”

- this super great essay about black widow and feminism (via helio-phile)

(It’s really funny to me when excerpts from things I write get more notes than actual things I write. I’m real bad at the micro part of microblogging.)

Hi, what do you think the chances are of Black Widow getting another solo comic? I know a lot of people who would buy it! I thought Marvel dropped hints a while back but we haven't heard anything since and I'm getting worried.

Mon, 29 Apr 2013 09:58:00 -0700

When they were first announcing Marvel NOW! there was a widespread assumption they’d put a Black Widow book in there, since Marvel was notably strapped for female leads. They shot that rumor down pretty specifically, w/Alonso saying that they didn’t have any solo plans for her. (Besides being a “prominent character” in books like Winter Soldier.)

More recently though (early February) there were definitely hints:

We wanted more titles anchored by female characters — that was a goal — but that doesn’t mean that any pitch that featured a female protagonist got rubber-stamped for approval. “Fearless Defenders” was approved because Ellie [Pyle] submitted a great pitch. Elsewhere, adjectiveless “X-Men” got a gust of wind in its sails when Jeanine Schaefer and Brian pitched a phenomenal concept for an all-female team. And — spoiler alert — perhaps there’s something on the horizon for Bla>cough< Wid>cough

So I’m pretty optimistic something will be announced within the year. I’m not too worried about nothing announced yet— they hinted about DeConnick’s Captain Marvel way before title was launched. And we’re kinda just getting into convention season, when they announce new books. I also suspect they might try to tie it loosely to some Big Event fallout or another, the way Hawkeye kind of came on the heels of him being incinerated in AvX.

Sort of a weird thing to say, but: it helps Natasha’s chances that Winter Soldier was cancelled too. I’ve always kinda suspected that the feeling was a Black Widow book would be too similar, and yeah, pretty much everything Winter Soldier did had been done before thematically in earlier BW books. But they’re already hinting they might relaunch Winter Soldier fairly soon! That’s sort of where you go to see how screwed female characters are in superhero comics: Black Widow is a Soviet spy for decades, Bucky is a dead sidekick killed off because sidekicks are dumb, but bring the guy back and slap on a Soviet spy backstory and readers’ll go for that instead.

As long as Natasha keeps appearing in movies and raising her profile that way, I’ll have hope, even if that February hinting comes to nothing, even if she needs twice the screentime as Hawkeye to get half the chance. With Captain America 2, we’re coming up on four times the screentime as Hawkeye, so that’s like, one whole chance!

Viper: No— oh, no! I’m going over the edge of the...

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 15:22:29 -0700

Viper: No— oh, no! I’m going over the edge of the propellor hub!
Even as Viper speaks— more in anger than fear— she reacts, her body twisting head over heels like a cat’s… her arms grabbing for the nearhest handhold.
Natasha: Very good, Viper. I couldn’t have done it better myself. In my younger days… I would have simply left you to your fate. But I’m older now, supposedly wiser, and I only kill when I’ve no alternative. So give me your hand.

I love this scene. Delicious Chris Claremont overwriting, amazing Bronze Age dialogue that should probably be inner monologue, and— “oh no! I’m going over the edge of the propellor hub!” But I love also how it gives Natasha mercy without having her forsake death. She’s as no nonsense as anyone can be, reciting their character arc to a green-haired superterrorist. No righteousness, but a sliver of weary compassion.

From Marvel Team-up #85, by Chris Claremont and Sal Buscema.

So, anon, I really like Hawkeye. I like him enough that when...

Thu, 25 Apr 2013 10:09:00 -0700

So, anon, I really like Hawkeye. I like him enough that when they said they were gonna put him in a movie I was immediately:

a) excited because they were gonna put him in a movie
b) angry because they were probably, inevitably, gonna put him in movie wrong
c) anticipating a legion of “hah hah arrows are so stupid lol” clever internet comments

I like Hawkeye, and so I’ve never understood why “he wears a purple loincloth, staples the letter H to his head, and proceeds to fight world-crushing horror with nothing but a bow and some arrows” is supposed to be a knock on Hawkeye. That’s exactly what makes Hawkeye great; he wasn’t born a god or subject to secret government power-granting experiments, he is a dude who put on purple tights and said, “alright evil, you’re next.” That doesn’t make him the most useful Avenger, maybe, but it sure as hell makes him interesting.

I love Natasha because I think she’s interesting.

She’s smart like the wink on a dagger. Not the sort of smart that builds plot machinetech superdevices but the sort of smart that twists and turns— the sort of smart that means her stories have to be smart, too. There’s something about Natasha that says, “keep looking.” Even her codename is fitting in how it’s all wrong.

I love how weird and rich and deep the Marvel universe is, but I also love its inconsistency. It’s a strange thing to say, but what fascinates me about Black Widow is the seeming contraditions: that she’s a spy, soldier, and superhero, an agent with agency, redemption without apology, the tragedy and the heroine together. She’s the best there is at what she does in a universe where the settings are much more looming-intergalactic-death than international espionage. She’s the best there is at what she does and that’s brought her suffering and white death and all the real good she can milk from it. I love that she’s so cold but so passionate, that her compassion comes from the same place as her cruelty. I love that vast Siberia of her continuity because there’s so much there to think about. Changing attitudes in politics, shifting standards of characterization, dialogue that Stan Lee wrote. There’s so much there to be confused by, and so much to figure out. But it works, I think. She’s enigmatic, but fully formed. Not broken. Just complicated.

It fascinates me too, that I can find all these things in her stories, all these ideas worth unthreading, and so many other people can see a token female or the ex-girlfriend of the Marvel Universe at large or a Mary Sue, or worse, a collection of bodyparts engineered solely for dudely amusement. None of those things are interesting, but the way people are often ready to call her useless before knowing much about her at all, that’s really interesting to me. And I might like her the way you would a secret: she’s much more badass than you know.

So I love Black Widow because I think about Black Widow, I think because I love, on and on forever and ever amen with karate kicks in the background.

biggestbaddestwolf replied to your post: What do you...

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 21:29:00 -0700

biggestbaddestwolf replied to your post: What do you think of how Marvel keeps referring to Natasha as Hawkeyes…

but work wife doesnt mean dating it literally means that theyve spent so much time together its like theyre married- its a term that cops use too

I know that. I can’t speak for anon, but: Natasha and Clint haven’t teamed up constantly since the Silver Age, and their original working partnership was desperately entwined with their romance. They went in very separate trajectories for quite a while and they hadn’t been in the same Avengers line-up until the Remender run of Secret Avengers. (I’m ignoring the Crossing b/c everyone does.) That was also about when Clint started being a spy. Natasha’s “work” is something that’s divided the two of them as much as brought them together. The idea of the two them as working “spouses”/partners comes from Ultimates, and the “work wife” thing is a much better description of their MCU dynamic since in comics they’ve hardly had a steady working relationship.

None of that has to do with dating, except, well, the fact that Clint and Natasha’s original 616 partnership was definitely not platonic. I can see how someone would look at their comic book history, look at the Avengers movie, and say, hmmmm. And that’s what I assumed anon was asking about.

What do you think of how Marvel keeps referring to Natasha as Hawkeye's 'Work Wife' in both Hawkeye and Avengers Assemble? I know Fraction and Deconnick are fan favorites, but it seems rather forced; despite their history.

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 20:37:00 -0700

It’s not a particularly accurate description, no, since while Clint and Natasha were partners (in literal crime), that working relationship died before their actual romance. And, yeah, they’ve been teamed up pretty rarely since the Silver Age— since 1972 Natasha’s lived in the Daredevil sphere of things at least as much as the Avengers and neither Natasha nor Clint has been able to leg a solo series past issue eight. When they have teamed up (see, oh, the Nicieza Hawkeye series, Thunderbolts #43, or Avengers #400) they have had a pretty easy, familiar relationship. But the team-ups were infrequent; I’d call them old friends more than constant co-workers.

That said, now that they are on five different Avengers teams that inexplicably share the same six characters, idk, I think it makes sense to focus on that more. I don’t think it’s any more forced than five different Avengers teams that inexplicably share the same six characters. “Hawkeye and Black Widow working together a lot” is not a movieconsequence I’m afraid of, I guess. It always seemed like they would work together a lot if their schedules and comics were set up to permit that. And I guess I’m just too tumblr to blink at silly catch phrases. Pairing names have forever inocculated me. (A week ago I found out “Stucky” was a thing, guys. Stucky!!)

TL;DR, I don’t think it’s the most accrate description of what they’ve been in the past but it doesn’t really bother me as a character direction. There are so many things Marvel’s screwed up with Natasha since the Avengers film (not even trying to give her a starring role someplace in the ongoing Marvel universe, all the brainwashing, that whole Maxim thing, artists constantly forgetting to draw her costume all the way on) that like, I don’t think I could like comics at all if I got bothered about more stuff. Nitpicky continuity rage is one of the specific joys of being a comic fan and I would never try to take that away from anyone. But DeConnick just wrote the sort of Black Widow story I’ve been whining for months that no one was writing. So if I don’t want to give up on this genre, I have to focus on that.