Black Widow Review

The tragedy of this film is timing. A character who spent a decade as a supporting player in other people's stories finally gets her own, two years after that story ended, so every stake is retroactive and every threat has a known outcome. What remains is surprisingly good in patches. The Ohio prologue, a fake suburban family fleeing at night under a mournful cover version, is genuinely arresting, and Florence Pugh's Yelena walks off with the entire picture, puncturing the superhero landing and the character's own mythology in the same breath.

David Harbour plays a fat, sad, boastful super soldier as pure comedy and never breaks it. Rachel Weisz is wasted. Then the plot turns up. Taskmaster is a mask with a gimmick and a reveal that lands with a thud, Dreykov is a leering cartoon whose defeat hinges on a pheromone lock, and the third act is a burning sky fortress full of interchangeable brainwashed women. Shortland shoots hand to hand fighting with welcome bruising weight. The family scenes work. Nearly everything built around them does not.