Saturday Night Live's version of a solo Black Widow movie offered a very different take on Natasha's solo adventure. The MCU kicked off with Iron Man in 2008, which was a surprise smash hit that kicked off a major franchise. Marvel's plan to make solo movies for characters like Thor and Captain America before teaming them for The Avengers seemed insanely ambitious and risky at the time, but it certainly paid off.
Scarlett Johansson's Natasha Romanova - AKA Black Widow - was first introduced to the MCU in 2010's Iron Man 2, and became an instrumental character in the franchise. Despite this, it took around a decade for Natasha to receive her own solo movie with the forthcoming Black Widow, which is currently set for release in late 2020. This is despite fans - and Johansson herself- calling for one since the early days of the MCU.
Scarlett Johansson was well aware of fan frustrations over the lack of a Black Widow movie - or any female-led superhero movies in general - when she acted as a guest host on Saturday Night Live in May 2015. This was timed with the release of 2015's Avengers: Age Of Ultron, which received controversy at the time for its handling of the character and the lack of Black Widow merchandise that was made available. SNL didn't miss a chance to jab the lack of a solo movie either, offering its own take on a potential Black Widow movie.
Dubbed Black Widow: Age Of Me, Saturday Night Live's film takes the form of a frothy romantic comedy where Natasha, who has just started a position at Fashion Weekly, falls for the charming cyborg Ultron. The trailer quickly runs through all the rom-com cliches, from the meet cute in the park to love life chat with friends - who in this case include Nick Fury, Thor and Captain America - before Ultron is revealed as a supervillain who breaks her heart. The preview ends with Bobby Monaghan's Hulk offering her ice cream - her favorite food.
Black Widow: Age Of Me is very much a pointed parody of the MCU's then seeming inability to put together a female superhero project, with the Saturday Night Live version depicting a "chick flick" dialed up to eleven. The sketch is mostly held together by Scarlett Johansson's game commitment to the premise, and it certainly offers up a different take than the actual Black Widow movie, which will explore her origins.