“Black Widow was actually leading the organization”: Avengers: Endgame Directors Scrapped Heartbreaking Scarlett Johansson Story from $2.79B Movie for a Strange Reason

Despite being close to three hours long, Avengers: Endgame was unable to cover every topic. This happened with Black Widow, played by Scarlett Johansson.

Well, it goes without saying that there were some heartbreaking scenes in Avengers: Endgame. Natasha Romanoff, however, is the subject of one of the most tragic storylines in the entire film. The beloved role in Avengers: Endgame after the five-year time jump was one particular concept that was dropped from the final product.

This happened after Natasha took charge of the remaining Avengers during the five-year time jump that followed their defeat of Thanos. However, Natasha’s job after Thanos was almost infinitely more heartbreaking than just looking after the team.

Scarlett Johansson
For a recap, Natasha never really knew her parents, was enlisted as an assassin at a young age, and was sterilized after her training.

Avengers: Endgame Director Removed Heartbreaking Scarlett Johansson’s Story?

In Avengers: Endgame, Scarlett Johansson‘s Black Widow worked tirelessly to defend the world from all dangers with the help of Rocket (Bradley Cooper), Captain Marvel (Brie Larson), Okoye (Danai Gurira), and other Avengers.

According to co-director Anthony Russo, Johansson’s assassin-turned-hero character in Avengers: Endgame was initially intended to help the world’s recently orphaned children.

Scarlett Johansson
When asked about one of the movie’s original subplots by Slate, Russo provided the following response:
“One thing that we talked about a lot–and I thought was really profound, but it was almost too large of an idea for us to wrangle, but we did try for a while–is just the idea that one-quarter of all children have no parents. Assuming you started with two parents. So that’s a lot of global orphans.”
The role of the Lucy actress in the 2019 Marvel Superhero film was then further discussed by Russo.
“Just the staggering number of that. I believe at one point really early in development, Black Widow was actually leading the organization in D.C. that was in charge of orphans, basically. That was what she was heading up five years later. But yes, it’s fascinating when you start running it down.”

Scarlett Johansson’s MCU Return as Black Widow

Despite the tragic end of Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow in Avengers: Endgame, the actress went on to star in her long-overdue solo movie. It also introduced the recurring character Yelena Belova (played by Florence Pugh). Also, the plot of Black Widow (2021 film) was set a few years before Avengers: Endgame.

In addition to the fact that death is rarely final in comic book-related stories, this does leave some room for Black Widow to appear in additional flashbacks. Johansson, however, has ruled out all of that.
Scarlett Johansson
Moreover, the actress confirmed she will not be working on any more Marvel Cinematic Universe projects in a lengthy interview with Variety, describing the decision as “bittersweet”.
“I am sad, of course. I absolutely loved every filming experience I had, working 10 years with Marvel and with that amazing cast, and I love the character Natasha. I have a lot of empathy for her, and it was amazing to build that character over such a long period of time. I also feel really good about her story coming to a close. I think she has a lot of dignity in her legacy.”
Avengers: Endgame, which was directed by Joe and Anthony Russo made $2.799 billion worldwide, and held the record for the highest-grossing movie of all time from July 2019 to March 2021.
Avengers: Endgame marked the peak of MCU’s popularity
The fifth and sixth installments of The Avengers film series, Avengers: The Kang Dynasty and Avengers: Secret Wars, are scheduled to hit theaters in 2026 and 2027, respectively.