weirdly a lot of natasha stuff this week?

there's this scene in white widow #4, which of course made me think back to yelena's first significant appearance back in the 1999 black widow mini

i do think it makes sense that yelena would like, need to find a new gig after most of the stuff after this mini was really awful for her. i do think this series went a little bit too far on the "yelena needs to discover herself" angle.

i still enjoyed it! but it also has the problem where… like, we see culmination of this story she does find a direction/belonging. but that's the end of the story and there's a major possibility no one will ever mention her supporting cast members in this series again, and the next yelena story will bring her back to square one with "finding" herself.

it can be a loop, which is not necessarily this story's fault but, for example, the previous yelena mini that was solicited to coincide with the black widow movie launch and then got totally mixed up due to covid, also featured yelena finding a direction.

(it was a pretty similar direction she winds up with in this one, where she goes after predatory corporations/oligarchs. it's a fine direction for her.)

all of this is like, much better than previous yelena limbo so i can't be too picky, but i think a kind of arrested development is a natural consequence of marvel doing more minis like this, which is generally something i like.

anyway there was also a short natasha story in the women of marvel anthology.

it's a silly story

i am still like ??? are bucky and natasha supposed to be an item now or was the scene in thunderbolts just a hook-up?

then there's a newish interview about the upcoming black widow and hawkeye mini here

which provides no info on the above question except that 1) phillips is doing a completely platonic natasha/clint dynamic at least in the present day and 2) bobbi will be there

also from the solicits damon dran

Oh I hadn’t seen Bobbi will be there I’m excited I hadn’t seen the interview

yeah i think she's a good choice esp if the villain is damon dran, a good mix of elements.

i'm excited for this mini.

the one thing that made me "???" in the interview is the part about clint and natasha being "very platonic" in the present day, which is like, an acceptable-to-me way to write their dynamic and probably a good choice if you're going for a contrast with their first appearances.

but both tales of suspense and the most recent black widow volume did a clint/bucky/natasha love triangle thing

comics!!