‘Black Widow’ cast adds Rachel Weisz and David Harbour

Rachel Weisz and David Harbour are joining the MCU
Rachel Weisz and David Harbour are joining the MCU

After years of rumours, the Black Widow movie (which will presumably be called Black Widow) appears to be moving faster than Natasha Romanoff pursuing a target. Now, we’re seeing two more exciting names joining the project.

Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow in Avengers Assemble (credit: Marvel Studios)
Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow in Avengers Assemble (credit: Marvel Studios)

Rachel Weisz and David Harbour are said to be circling the film, with ongoing talks moving in a positive direction, according to Variety.

Lady Macbeth star Florence Pugh is already on board, with Cate Shortland signed on to direct. Jac Schaeffer will write the script.

Read more: Every Marvel movie coming after ‘Avengers: End Game’

While there’s no firm plot details, let alone character descriptions, we can have a good guess about what the film will involve. The current rumour is that it’ll be an origin movie, but, following the failure of Red Sparrow (a Black Widow origin movie in all but name), we think it’ll be an Endgame follow up.

If you look to the comics, the most likely inspiration is a book called ‘Winter Soldier.’ Not to be confused with ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’ which was the inspiration of the MCU movie of the same name.

Captain America faces The Winter Soldier (credit: Marvel Studios)
Captain America faces The Winter Soldier (credit: Marvel Studios)

‘Winter Soldier’ is set after Captain America’s death, after Bucky Barnes has replaced Steve Rogers as the shield slinger.

Black Widow is a huge part of the book – with her past being a driving force of the narrative. In fact, she even becomes the antagonist at one point, with a former Soviet assassin brainwashing Romanoff into attacking her friends.

Read more: Florence Pugh set to join ‘Black Widow’

Add in the fact that Bucky Barnes is getting his own Disney+ series, so will presumably be around after Endgame, this dynamic would be a cool echo of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which was essentially a Black Widow movie (Scarlett Johansson’s character went on the biggest journey as a character, and even faced the main villain at the end).

There’s a couple of characters in ‘Winter Soldier’ who could get the MCU treatment – David Harbour could make a cool Leonid Novok, the main antagonist of the comic. And, if you do a simple google image search of Lucia von Bardas, you’ll see that Rachel Weisz would be a perfect fit for that character.

Rachel Weisz resembles Lucia von Bardas, the ‘Winter Soldier’ villain.
Rachel Weisz resembles Lucia von Bardas, the ‘Winter Soldier’ villain.

Time will tell, but whoever they end up playing, Harbour and Weisz are cool additions to an already cool cast.