Florence Pugh will take over the Black Widow Marvel universe from Scarlett Johansson in the next Avengers-related movie.
Black Widow director Cate Shortland has revealed that she and the film’s producers had no idea how “great” the Little Women star would be and they’ve decided to retire Scarlett’s Natasha Romanoff and lead upcoming films with Pugh’s Yelena Belova character.
“We realized that the audience would expect an origin story so, of course, we went in the opposite direction,” Shortland told Empire. “And we didn’t know how great Florence Pugh would be. We knew she would be great, but we didn’t know how great.
“Scarlett is so gracious, like, ‘Oh, I’m handing her the baton’. So it’s going to propel another female storyline.”
Black Widow is scheduled to hit theaters in October and November (2020) after its initial May 1 release date was postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
