History of Black Widow

[Music] what's up everyone today Marvel month rolls on with one of Marvel's best and at this point most loved characters Black Widow she's been a major part of the MCU for the past decade and of course a prominent character in Marvel Comics for a lot longer than that so to be honest we were kind of shocked when we realized that we hadn't done an episode on her yet I also want to remind you guys again that our big Marvel month Avengers giveaway is still going so be sure to sign up for that the link for the complete details on how to enter is in the description and it will be going on all month long now let's get into the long overdue history of Black Widow [Applause] black widow was created by Stanley Don Rico and Don heck and she made her first appearance in tales of suspense issue 52 in April of 1964 originally she was a villain but of course would eventually go on to join the Avengers and she made her first appearance in the Avengers comic and Avengers issue 29 in May of 1966 speaking of 1966 her original costume as you could see in the issue is similar to that of Catwoman's from the 66th Adam West Batman TV series with obvious tweaks here and there coincidence I think not in any case let's take a look at black widows comic origin Natalya or Natasha Romanova or Romanoff tomato tomahto was born in 1928 but there are several different accounts of black widows early life and it gets kind of confusing so I'm gonna do the best I can to simplify them and give you guys an overview the first backstory states that Natasha's mother gives custody of Natasha to a Russian soldier named ivan petrovich who then raised her as his adopted daughter eventually training her as a loyal Soviet spy who would help her homeland then in another account of her early life Natasha's home was attacked by Nazis during the Battle of Stalingrad in 1928 in the attack the building her family lived in was set on fire and in an act of desperation Natasha's mother gave baby Natasha to the same Russian soldier named Ivan after her mother died in the fire I've been adopted and raised Natasha but we also see that she was trained by the ussr's Black Widow ops program you see apparently I haven't had taken her to Department X where she was trained in combat and espionage at the covert Red Room facility while there she was biologically in psycho technologically enhanced this in turn gave her an unusually long life span and a prolonged youthful appearance through all of this she became one of their elite agents known as the Black Widow we also learned that Black Widow had false memories and planted in her to help ensure her loyalty so Natasha was given memories of becoming a ballerina having said that it also explains why her origin and early years are a bit all over the place in the end the main pieces we need to know is that Natasha was trained at a very young age as a Russian spy for the KGB she then became their best recruit and was given the name the Black Widow and as an active KGB agent one of her assignments was to infiltrate Stark Industries to assassinate Anton Vanko which I'm gonna get into right now with story arcs [Music] in black widows first appearance in tales of suspense issue 52 we see her assigned to infiltrate Stark Industries in order to assassinate professor Anton Vanko Vanka was a Soviet spy sent to sabotage Stark Industries but was convinced to switch sides by a young Tony Stark he's also the first Crimson Dynamo anyway back to Black Widow her plans to kill Anton are intercepted and stopped by iron men and with stark being the handsome billionaire playboy that he is Natasha found herself attracted to him so she was like you know what I'm going to distract him so that my partner can destroy Starks facilities but while trying to carry out her scheme her partner Boris is killed by Anton when he shoots Boris causing his suit to explode however Anton died in the explosion as well Natasha would then escape but decided to stay in America and act as an undercover spy in order to regain the favor of the KGB so she went to Tony Stark to pretend to apologize for her previous actions hoping to seduce him and get close enough to steal his anti-gravity device and in another case of booty blindness stark forgave her a decision that she would quickly make him regret because as soon as his guard was down she used paralyzing gas on him and stole his anti-gravity machine she then used it to cause all sorts of destruction in the end Iron Man was able to destroy the device with a proton electric charge so that she couldn't hurt or destroy anything or anyone else but ultimately he was unable to catch Black Widow shortly after this she would also charm Hawkeye into being her pawn however the two would get into a battle with Iron Man where Black Widow suffered a severe head injury she was saved by Hawkeye before she could be captured and this led to her developing feelings for the archer but it didn't last long because she was later brainwashed by the Russians in order to return her to loyal servitude and was ordered to face off against the Avengers eventually she shook off the effects of the brainwashing and made amends with the Avengers by switching sides in helping them fight and after she proved herself a friend in a valuable asset she officially joined the Avengers becoming the 16th person inducted into the team although I will add she was not a full-time member because she didn't respect the Avengers oath of not killing over the years she worked on and off with the Avengers as well as shield being a freelance double agent operative against the KGB for example in the amazing spider-man issue 86 she is seen leaving the Avengers while simultaneously breaking off a relationship with Hawkeye this is also the issue where Black Widow finally gets her iconic black costume and wrist shooters container widow bites this would ultimately lead her to getting her own stories and book titled Amazing Adventures the Inhumans and the Black Widow that premiered with issue one in 1970 as you would imagine the title focus on stories of black widows solo missions and really established her as a killer assassin being able to take down groups of men all by herself the split book featured the character for eight issues before being dropped but fret not right after her first solo outing ended she was featured and co-starred with daredevil in daredevil issues 81 through 124 as I said earlier Natasha broke off her complicated relationship with Hawkeye and left the Avengers after which she became an all-new black widow the one we know and love today in any case she became a vigilante fighting criminals in New York because of this she would naturally encounter other heroes who fought crime in New York like spider-man but in this case I'm referring to daredevil the pair quickly took a liking to one another so they teamed up and went on to have a romantic relationship in fact Matt Murdock and Natasha's relationship was so serious that Matt broke up with his longtime and fan favorite love interest Karen page the new lovebirds then moved to San Francisco to start their new life and of course continue fighting crime Marv will also try to give Black Widow more of a normal life giving her a personal career as a fashion designer but that failed long story short daredevil and Black Widow would be a couple for quite some time but ultimately Natasha broke up with Matt because she felt that he wasn't treating her equally on the battlefield the two would remain friends however and she continued to help him fight crime whenever he needed after this Black Widow rejoin The Avengers for a brief time starting in Avengers issue 111 before being added to the champions superhero team series in the mid to late 1970s the team in series consisted of Black Widow Hercules Ghost Rider Iceman and Angel throughout most of the 80s and 90s she would be a recurring member of the Avengers as well as a freelance agent for shield which leads us to the 2000s where Black Widow still plays a massive role in the Marvel Universe around this time is where she came into conflict with the second Black Widow Yelena Bulova who was trained by the same spy masters as Natasha Natasha would also find herself on the side of Iron Man during civil war just like in the MCU then in Secret Invasion she would join the Mighty Avengers which led to her being part of the massive scroll battle in Central Park anyway Black Widow would also be part of the Dark Reign storyline secretly infiltrating Norman Osborn's Thunderbolts fighting against him and his Dark Avengers speaking of Dark Avengers I feel like we might need to do an episode on them that might have to happen it is Marvel month after all but skipping some stuff here and there we have the secret Empire story where Black Widow was killed by the fake Steve Rogers aka the Hydra Steve Rogers when he hits her in the face with his shield breaking her neck but don't worry this is comics and she came back with an explanation that deals with clones and memory implants comics in any case Natasha Romanoff is back and currently has a five issue limited series with the final issue dropping later this month the series deals with her coming back from the dead but what's all that said friends it's time for some powers and abilities first off Black Widow has taken a different version of the Super Soldier Serum this gave her physical abilities much like Captain America though not as great as his she possesses peak level physiology making her as strong agile fast endurable as a female human can possibly be without being classified as a superhuman this also extends to her senses and immune system which are similarly heightened to peak human level from a young age Natasha was trained in the martial arts she is an expert in karate judo Kenpo jujitsu ninjutsu Muay Thai and multiple styles of Kung Fu she's also an expert sharpshooters spy and Acrobat natasha has become one of the top espionage operatives in the world and has proven herself to be one of the best information gatherers in the entire Marvel Universe she is also fluent in several different languages and is an expert computer program hacker she's so good in fact she has been a leader of the Avengers and shield on several different occasions as for equipment Black Widow wears a black skintight cat suit that's made of a special fabric that protects her from small firearms and high temperatures she also carries an array of weapons but her primary one is her famous Widow bites that she shoots via her wrist cartridges they emit an electric blast with an output of up to 30,000 volts she has way more powers and abilities but now it's time for some reading recommendations check out tales of suspense 52 black widow volume 1 the finely woven thread Black Widow vol 2 the tightly tangled web Black Widow the name of the rose Black Widow Home Coming black widow the sting of the widow and her 2019 self-titled miniseries that should be enough to get you all started [Music] first up for May first we have the amazing spider-man 20.1 the vulture is one of spider-man's oldest villains but that doesn't make him any less dangerous here we have Batman issue 70 now that Batman has escaped the nightmares he's starting to see the forces rallying against him and that his father from another universe has joined the other side now we have cosmic Ghost Rider destroys Marvel history issue 3 cosmic Ghost Rider becomes an x-men whether Charles Xavier likes it or not what could make cosmic Ghost Rider even more powerful how about slapping some Phoenix sports in there now we have DC's year of the villain issue 1 evil is winning Lex Luthor and the Legion of Doom conspire with the cosmic gods bending mankind toward a dark destiny that's all I need to know I'm in finally we have deceased issue 1 a mysterious techno virus has been released on earth infecting 600 million people and turning them instantly into violent monstrous engines of destruction the heroes of the DC Universe are caught completely unprepared for a pandemic of this magnitude and struggle to save their loved ones first but what happens to the world's greatest heroes if the world ends and that's gonna bring another episode of ban to a close but remember our adventures 1 giveaway is still going on you have until May 23rd to enter to find the link for that in the description other than that be sure to follow us on Twitter Facebook and Instagram but I'll see you guys next time when I talk about all things comics

Channel: Variant Comics

Views: 181,283

Rating: 4.962996 out of 5

Keywords: Black Widow, Avengers Endgame, Avengers, Marvel, Marvel Comics, Natasha Romanoff, Hawkeye, Daredevil, Iron Man, Captain America, Comic Books, Variant

Id: 4uLIErUay-Q

Length: 10min 41sec (641 seconds)

Published: Wed May 01 2019