The Marvel Movie Black Widow Is Most Like

In a movie franchise as vast and varied as the Marvel Cinematic Universe, finding a unique identity for an individual movie can be a challenge. Every character's series has to provide something new, and it can take multiple attempts for a saga to really find its voice. The best example of this is likely the transition in humor and tone from "Thor" to "Thor: Ragnarok."

With Marvel's next big-budget film, however, they are doing their best to avoid the long, three-movie process that the "Thor" series went through to hit its stride. Black Widow might not be new, but the "Black Widow" film series is. Now, director Cate Shortland and her team are trying their hardest to make an old character feel fresh in the limelight. That being said, the movie is still meant to feel familiar to longtime MCU fans. In a recent interview, Shortland revealed the Marvel movie that "Black Widow" resembles the most.

The creative team of "Black Widow" took inspiration from many different places in the process of making the movie, including other Marvel films. In an interview with Fandango posted on June 11, Shortland revealed that "Black Widow" reminds people who have seen it of 2014's "Captain America: The Winter Soldier."

"It's got great action. It's got a lot of heart, it's emotional," Shortland said. "And at times, it can be a little bit dark, but then it opens up again. And it's really exciting. So I think that's like this film."

Of course, this comparison makes a lot of sense. For one thing, in the second "Captain America" film, Natasha Romanoff (a.k.a. Black Widow, played by Scarlett Johansson) plays a big part in the action. Likewise, that film's story of political intrigue and espionage lines up with how "Black Widow" delves into Romanoff's spy origins.

However, that doesn't mean "Black Widow" is a retread of "Winter Soldier." Shortland also looked to "No Country for Old Men" when developing to film's darker moments, and added a healthy dosage of feminism and family from "Thelma and Louise." With this combination, Shortland believes she has concocted the right mixture of pathos and action to tell a story about a woman's troubled past within a league of specially-trained female operatives. Fans around the world are excited to see this film's unique take on the MCU formula when it releases in theatres July 9.