Black Widow Almost Wore A Very Silly Costume In ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier,’ According To Scarlett Johansson

Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow solo movie arrives on July 9, both in theaters and in streaming format via Disney+ Premier Access. In the movie, Natasha Romanoff’s in post Captain America: Civil War mode, which means that she’s still sporting red locks even though she’s technically in fugitive mode. There’s time to clear up all those pesky details later, right What matters here is that Scarlett’s reflecting upon Natasha’s different looks over the years, which began with a catsuit tour in Iron Man 2 before the character spun through several hairstyles, including rocking those i-can’t-be-bothered-with-nice-hair-post-apocalypse red roots after the snap.

Beginning in The Avengers, Black Widow’s look became increasingly practical, and by the time that Captain America: The Winter Soldier rolled around, Natasha was allowed to sport comfier clothing. That included a brown leather jacket over a black tank and pants, as well as a movement-friendlier catsuit. That wasn’t always the total plan, however, and Scarlett has now opened up about how the below scene — in which Natasha drives up to Steve Rogers and Sam Wilson and cracks a joke about looking for a “fossil” — could have rolled very differently.

As Scarlett describes things to Fatherly, the writers initially wanted Natasha to pull up in the sports car while wearing (presumably) short-skirted tennis outfit with a blonde wig. That idea swiftly got axed, and Scarlett attributes the idea as being down to “a lot of male writers,” which makes this all the more amusing:

When we were doing Captain America: The Winter Soldier — this is a really funny thing — the look is fantastic and utilitarian. She first drives up in this beautiful car and picks up Cap, and initially in the script, it was like, she arrives in her tennis whites, with a blonde wig. It was very quickly killed.

You work with a lot of male writers. Things were shifting. You have to be a part of the change. Audiences are also demanding stuff and there’s a cultural shift and it feeds everything into a more progressive direction. It’s been a process, it’s been a process.

Scarlett also explains that Marvel initially wanted Black Widow to be “a shape-shifter,” but even if that had turned out to be the case, an all-legs tennis outfit would have been bizarre. That’s especially the case because Steve Rogers couldn’t even handle profanity at the time. The dude got used to it, but he probably would have turned bright red to see Natasha in a blonde wig at that point, which may have meant a larger CGI budget, and so on. Alright, now I’m being the silly one, but seriously, thank goodness for an absence of Tennis Natasha in the MCU.