Marvel Fans Still Want That Black Widow Solo Movie, According to New Poll
Of the original Avengers cast, only Jeremy Renner’s Hawkeye and Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow haven’t starred in their own solo movies. While audiences only really warmed up to Hawkeye thanks to his arc in Age of Ultron, fans have been enamored with Black Widow since she made her debut in the otherwise-underwhelming Iron Man 2. There’s been talk off and on over the last few years about a Black Widow solo movie, and just in case the people in suits over at Marvel are wondering: yes, audiences still very much want to see it.
At the request of USA Today, Fandango polled 1,000 moviegoers who have already purchased their tickets for Captain America: Civil War, asking them to choose which of the Avengers they’d like to see star in their very own solo movie — among the heroes who haven’t gotten the standalone spotlight already, of course.
Unsurprisingly, Black Widow ranked highest at 48 percent, followed by Paul Bettany’s Vision at 15 percent, Anthony Mackie’s Falcon with 12 percent, Hawkeye with 10 percent, and Don Cheadle’s War Machine with eight percent, while Elizabeth Olsen’s Scarlet Witch ranked last with just seven percent.
Over the last couple of years, Johansson has expressed interest in starring in a Black Widow solo film, while Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige has admitted that he’s discussed the possibility with Johansson on more than one occasion and both parties are interested in making it happen. More recently, Joe and Anthony Russo said they’d love to make a Black Widow film — so what’s the hold up?
Like Johansson’s Black Widow, Wonder Woman also ranked highest in a recent Fandango poll, in which moviegoers were asked which Batman v Superman character they were most excited to see on the big screen. That excitement was validated when Gal Gadot effortlessly stole the show from her male counterparts, despite the fact that she only had about seven minutes of screen time.
Warner Bros. is set to beat Marvel to the female solo superhero movie punch with next year’s Wonder Woman, while Captain Marvel doesn’t arrive until 2019. Could a Black Widow movie be part of the studio’s Phase 4 plans? If not, then the studio would be making a major — and majorly disappointing — mistake. Not only is Johansson hugely bankable (Lucy, a film based on an original concept, grossed $459 million), but Marvel fans clearly love Black Widow. It seems like a no-brainer at this point.