When is Black Widow set? Marvel movie's timeline explained
How the new Black Widow movie fits into the wider Marvel canon – and why it might be more complicated than you realise.
When is Black Widow set? Well, technically the answer is just “2016” – but in Marvel terms it’s a little more complicated than that, with the new film’s action technically taking place in the gaps between other movies that came out years ago.
“I think the expectation was that it would be an origin story,” director Cate Shortland told RadioTimes.com of the decision to place Black Widow in between other Marvel movies. “So we wanted to move away from that. Like it touches on her past, obviously. But we wanted it to be more than that.
“The struggle for me was not so much the parameters of the timeline, but was working out who she was as a character and what we wanted the movie to actually say about her.
“I mean, that's always the struggle. Even if you're not doing a superhero movie, I think that's the struggle.”
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Accordingly, instead of jumping back decades as in other Marvel prequels like Captain America: The First Avenger or Captain Marvel, Black Widow’s story takes place between previous appearances for the character – after Captain America: Civil War, but before her double appearances in Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame.
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In fact, due to the time jump in Endgame, Black Widow takes place around seven years before the character’s death, meaning that by the time the credits roll she still has plenty of adventures ahead of her.
For more details of Black Widow in the Marvel timeline check out the below – though beware for minor spoilers for the new movie.
When is Black Widow set?
Black Widow is set in 2016 – specifically, following the events of 2016 movie Captain America: Civil War, which saw a group of heroes defy governments to maintain their independence. While Natasha originally sided with the pro-Sokovia Accords team, she later switches sides to help Cap (Chris Evans) and Bucky (Sebastian Stan) board a plane.
The film opens with her fleeing Germany, the site of the major hero-vs-hero battle at an airport that preceded the final clash between Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr), Cap and Bucky. Hot on her trail is Secretary Ross (William Hurt), who played a major role in Civil War as a secondary antagonist.
“The film takes place on the heels of Captain America: Civil War,” co-producer Brian Chapek said.
“Natasha has broken the Sokovia Accords, betrayed Secretary Ross, and the Avengers find themselves disbanded. In the beginning of the movie, we establish Natasha desperate to evade Ross and leave U.S. soil. When she gets an opportunity to start over again, she quickly realizes that there are darker forces out there in the world that compel her to return to the action.”
However, in an interesting final twist of the timeline, the film doesn’t lead straight into Infinity War. Instead, it seems to imply that the final scene of Captain America: Civil War (where Cap and an offscreen Natasha spring some of the imprisoned Avengers from the Raft prison) is yet to happen.
And weirdly, this sort of means that the entire plot of Black Widow takes place within the timeline of Civil War, even if it’s largely set after the main action of the story. We guess Natasha just had a really busy weekend off…
Still, the film certainly seems to suggest that Natasha will soon be off to the adventures of Infinity War at the end, with the character sporting the distinctive short blond bob haircut (above) she wore in that movie (and not before or since) as she heads off at the end of the story. She’s also got her hands on a fancy plane used by the fugitive team in the 2018 film, if you ever wondered how they had use of that.
A later post-credits scene, which we won’t spoil here, appears to be set during the “present day” of the MCU (which is 2023 for time jump reasons), and possibly after Disney Plus series The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.
How does Black Widow fit in the Marvel timeline?
If you were so inclined on a big Marvel rewatch, you could probably watch Black Widow after Captain America Civil War, before moving on to Doctor Strange and so on.
In fact, if it weren’t for a later-set post-credits scene, the whole film’s story could sit as an early part of Marvel Phase Three, rather than the Phase Four beginning it really is – and in many ways, it would serve as some good backstory for the events of Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame, which are set later but were released in cinemas much earlier.
“In Avengers: Endgame we saw Natasha get to a place in her life where she could make the ultimate sacrifice for the greater good,” Chapek said.
“Now we want to tell the story about who she really is as a human being and what led to her being capable of making that heroic decision.”
If you want to get really particular, of course, the film is also set after certain parts of Avengers: Endgame - including Natasha's death. You see, in Endgame she and teammate Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) travel back in time to 2014 to get their hands on an Infinity Stone in outer space, and she dies on the planet Vormir. That means that during Black Widow, Natasha's future dead body has been floating around somewhere for two years...even if nobody except the Red Skull knew about it yet. Weird.
Of course, it’s not the first time the MCU has pushed things out of sequence. Despite being released in 2017, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is set in 2014 (which is why Groot is still so small), while 2018’s Ant-Man and the Wasp is largely set before Avengers: Infinity War despite coming out months later.
Still, Black Widow’s jump back feels like the most surgical insertion yet of new material into the MCU backstory. Who knows what they could do next? A movie showing what Rocket got up to during the “blip”? A Disney Plus series set between scenes in Avengers: Age of Ultron showing how Nick Fury got the Helicarrier working again? In Marvel, all things are possible…
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Read more about the MCU's latest as we discuss the Black Widow timeline, the Black Widow ending, the Black Widow post-credits scene, a possible Black Widow and how to watch the Marvel movies in order.
Black Widow is in UK cinemas now, and on Disney Plus Premier Access on Friday 9th July. You can sign up to Disney+ for £7.99 a month or £79.90 a year now.
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