nice day for a white widow
Jul. 10th, 2021 11:03 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eleanorjaneSo, Black Widow!
Overall, I really liked it , though I felt the climax and resolution of the A-plot were the weakest parts of the movie. Yelena was a fucking gift throughout the entire thing though and I really hope she gets incorporated into whatever teamups happen in Phase 4 onwards.
I actually think it was a stronger standalone movie than as part of the MCU. I felt that it worked best as a Dark Angel analogue, I guess -- a former brainwashed child soldier finally getting closure on her fucked-up childhood and being able to move forward with a lighter heart. I think the third act would actually have worked better if the Red Room was not a global threat with a cloud base, but a Jason Bourne or Winter Soldier-style ugly tile-and-lino institution where the threat and the horror are intensely personal. You can still have Dreykov, Taskmaster and a couple of Widows as the antagonists; you don't need to up the stakes with dozens of hostile Widows and then a MacGuffin to take them out of the fight. That doesn't fit so well in the MCU, though, especially not after Phase 3. The personal story of Nat and Yelena and Nat-and-Yelena, and the healing of their family, was by far the strongest part of the movie to me.
I'm also very grateful that, unlike what the trailers telegraphed, Melina was not Taskmaster, and didn't betray Nat.
As a female viewer, Dreykov (and the Red Room as a thinly veiled metaphor for the patriarchy, complete with gross villain quote about girls being the only resource the world has too much of) felt entirely credible, and despite some of the criticism I've seen, I didn't think he needed an additional ideology or agenda to be a plausible and hateable villain. As the saying goes: the cruelty is the point.
I'm still angry about what the MCU did to Nat, and I want her back, dammit. But if we're not going to get her back, I can live with Yelena taking her place, as long as we get lots of her in what's coming.
Overall, I really liked it , though I felt the climax and resolution of the A-plot were the weakest parts of the movie. Yelena was a fucking gift throughout the entire thing though and I really hope she gets incorporated into whatever teamups happen in Phase 4 onwards.
I actually think it was a stronger standalone movie than as part of the MCU. I felt that it worked best as a Dark Angel analogue, I guess -- a former brainwashed child soldier finally getting closure on her fucked-up childhood and being able to move forward with a lighter heart. I think the third act would actually have worked better if the Red Room was not a global threat with a cloud base, but a Jason Bourne or Winter Soldier-style ugly tile-and-lino institution where the threat and the horror are intensely personal. You can still have Dreykov, Taskmaster and a couple of Widows as the antagonists; you don't need to up the stakes with dozens of hostile Widows and then a MacGuffin to take them out of the fight. That doesn't fit so well in the MCU, though, especially not after Phase 3. The personal story of Nat and Yelena and Nat-and-Yelena, and the healing of their family, was by far the strongest part of the movie to me.
I'm also very grateful that, unlike what the trailers telegraphed, Melina was not Taskmaster, and didn't betray Nat.
As a female viewer, Dreykov (and the Red Room as a thinly veiled metaphor for the patriarchy, complete with gross villain quote about girls being the only resource the world has too much of) felt entirely credible, and despite some of the criticism I've seen, I didn't think he needed an additional ideology or agenda to be a plausible and hateable villain. As the saying goes: the cruelty is the point.
I'm still angry about what the MCU did to Nat, and I want her back, dammit. But if we're not going to get her back, I can live with Yelena taking her place, as long as we get lots of her in what's coming.
(no subject)
Date: 2021-07-10 03:02 am (UTC)100 percent. I thought that line was the most chilling in the whole movie. It’s terrifying how many men see women as nothing but a resource.