Scarlett Johansson's Marvel Baton Being Handed To Florence Pugh in 'Black Widow'

The Black Widow baton is being handed over from Scarlett Johansson to Florence Pugh.

In a recent interview with Empire magazine, director Cate Shortland opened up about how the upcoming Marvel movie will serve as a baton passing, of sorts between Natasha and Florence‘s Yelena.

“[Kevin Feige] realized that the audience would expect an origin story so, of course, we went in the opposite direction,” she shared. “We didn’t know how great Florence Pugh would be. We knew she would be great, but we didn’t know how great.”

Cate added, “Scarlett is so gracious, like, ‘Oh, I’m handing her the baton.’ So it’s going to propel another female storyline.”

The director also opened up about how Black Widow will also be a proper goodbye to Natasha Romanoff, as fans weren’t exactly happy with how the character left in Avengers: Endgame.

“In Endgame, the fans were upset that Natasha did not have a funeral. Whereas Scarlett, when I spoke to her about it, said Natasha wouldn’t have wanted a funeral,” Cate said. “She’s too private, and anyway, people don’t really know who she is.”

“So what we did in this film was allow the ending to be the grief the individuals felt, rather than a big public outpouring. I think that’s a fitting ending for her.”

Black Widow is expected to open in theaters on November 6th.

Did you know that Scarlett first lost out on the role of Natasha? See what she said here…