 Hello there, ladies and gentlemen. I thought I might take a look at a particular scene from the MCU now that Phase Four is in full effect. I think it would be fascinating to compare not only how much the writing discipline has changed, but how much can be achieved when using every last word on the page to your advantage. So let's go with a familiar character. We can talk about why she's so effective. Natasha Romanov is incredibly formidable because of her creative, yet grounded thinking. Perfect for solving problems that would likely have killed her otherwise. She's not an idiot who hopes everything will work out. To fully illustrate what's been lost, let's compare an aspect of her abilities that should be top notch as it's specific to her training and she's practiced it for decades, making her a master. Natasha conducts two interrogations in The Avengers. One in her opening scene and one with Loki. She also conducts one in her own movie, taking place in the third act with Dreykov. Let's compare that opening scene with the Dreykov scene. The first thing we see happen is Natasha getting hit, to then express to the audience frustration and boredom. Only to her captors she poses as very much afraid and completely out of her depth. Her captor then makes an assumption on who she's working for. Whoever Salahub is, Nat needs information on him as well as the lads here. By posing as an agent with poor information, misplaced confidence and a subtextual admittance that the interrogator is correcting her, she's coaxing information she may otherwise come across as desperate for. As a form of boast, the captor is telling Natasha that Lementov is not the man who moves their materials and that she has outdated information, prompting the correction. He's asking that Natasha pass this on to her boss. Of course she's lied about having a boss that isn't shield, while simultaneously trying to come across as having given that up by accident. Only Coulson interrupts her and her glamour drops, talking to Phil in a completely different tone, surprising her interrogators. And this is the climax. We have a complete demeanor change from Nat as she speaks to shield, chastising them for interrupting her work and insulting her captors for having given her what she needs. This is Natasha Romanov, creative, resistant, fantastic under pressure, superbly intelligent, manipulative and of course seductive. This scene completes with her dominating her captors, grabbing her shoes and revealing she was conducting the interrogation the entire time, only to be told she has to see Bruce, giving her pause for thought. A wonderful juxtaposition to how bold she just was, assisting the audience's understanding of the Hulk and his reputation. Now, let's take a look at her solo movie. The interrogation opens with this. Natasha begins with telling her subjects they are pathetic in the hopes that they get defensive. An interesting choice when dealing with Draykov, the man who for 30 years plus has controlled the most secret espionage institution with a deft hand having complete victory within his grasp. But let's see what happens. Again, she focuses on belittling him, a single track that if fails leaves her with nothing. She's saying that he's pathetic and has nothing because no one knows what he has, when that was the plan, to subvert the world leaders or, well, everyone without their knowledge, to take over every significant industry and organization without anyone having realized it. All she's highlighted is his success, a success she shares in her line of work, being that she is desperate for people to never know what she has or what she's capable of. He has control of a major empire with the potential to control every single person in the world. I would say that's pretty incredible. More so when it's being conducted entirely in secret. Yet that very element is what she's trying to shame him with. The dialogue is entirely lost, employing a very basic form of reverse psychology, the kind of shit children do without having really thought about it. And to add insult to injury, Natasha is doing this to the guy who organized the entire system that taught Natasha how to do this in the first place. In a way that's the saddest part. Why wouldn't Draykov announce that this is the most embarrassing display he's ever seen? That in his many decades of teaching Black Widows how to siphon information from a subject without their knowledge, he's never seen such a sorry attempt. In a way he's ashamed she would try. She could then evolve the conversation into a meta back and forth about his guidance, his teachings, and the program itself. She can draw information out of him by claiming the widows are insufficient, that she's proof his operation will fail and that he couldn't possibly have any foothold worth using. When he either oversteps defensively or the interrogation fails, she could realize that being sincere about her own history is exactly how she can get to him. There were so many options here and instead of any of them we did this. And so she interrupted him and told him to shut up. This made him upset, and like any king of the incels, he spilled his entire design to her, on top of revealing the access requirements. He gave her everything in the hopes that she'll say something positive about him. You can see the writer's hand throughout this scene. She says he's pathetic, and as a defense he blurs out his entire plan and current status to impress her. The only thing we need to finish this off is her spelling it out. And that's pretty much it. She managed to coax everything out of her subject by essentially saying you're pathetic and you want to impress me by telling me what you've done and showing me how to access your console. It doesn't even line up with the film's own logic. She's telling him the problem is that he's achieved it without people knowing. And his response was oh yeah, well look at just how much everyone doesn't know. Like if we're pretending she made a good point, which is how he feels, then he didn't counter it at all. In the prior example she used her wit, her deception, her sex appeal, and her combat training to finish it off. In this instance she got punched and says you're pathetic. And it worked. She is rewarded for her brain dead approach, telling her subject what she wants while using absolutely no tact, no physical expertise, and no manipulation beyond getting incredibly lucky. And that's on top of the luck of seeing how to access the console. Had he faced away from her while accessing it she would have been fucked. In the first scenario the subject doesn't even realize their own taunts have provided information. In the second the subject is desperate to reveal everything because he was told he sucks. Natasha Romanov in terms of her abilities as Black Widow has been completely reduced, from her general intelligence to her battle plans to her primary abilities of manipulation and interrogation of subjects to even her combat have been crippled significantly, or entirely stripped away in the movie that's supposed to be all about her. It's a huge shame because these elements help give her an enormous impact on screen, especially in the Loki interrogation. Alright enough, let's break that scene down. To really bring home how far the MCU has fallen when it comes to writing, let me explain why this fucking scene is a banger. And it's far from the only one in The Avengers, one of the strongest movies in the MCU. Loki has been captured by SHIELD, and they want to know why he gave up so easily, as well as where he's taken the Tesseract, leading us to this scene. We open nice and subtle with a smile. The God of Mischief, a king of illusion appreciating a human's ability to surprise him with her arrival, and an appreciation from Natasha that Loki is smart enough to know she was on the way. Not just because this is one of her roles in SHIELD, but because she has an investment in Barton, and Loki has been privy to Clint's insight. It's clear he is excited to have this exchange. So, this is pretty good for a few seconds. Both parties understand that Natasha needs information from Loki. However, Loki holds all of the leverage in this conversation. He has nothing to lose while having everything to gain in causing this stalwart woman who has taken down so many in this very environment, a lasting moment of anguish. Something hundreds of people have likely failed to do, as is her reputation, giving him an increased sense of purpose at this stage. Because Loki, despite ideas from future writers, does indeed adore causing pain and fear. This is the opening gambit. Natasha lets Loki know she cares about Barton more than the end of the world. A declaration that likely has a lot of truth within it, so he counters with a barb about love triumphing over all. A concept they both find childish compared to specific and meaningful investments for a person and your history with them. She goes on to explain when he asks that Barton saved her and set her life on a lighter path, that before him she didn't care who she hurt. This is quite a blatant yet prompted explanation, giving the audience much more of her history to chew on, but it's entirely warranted in that it supports her opening and Loki is left with one response to confirm Barton's value to Natasha. Loki is now very excited, knowing that Natasha cares more for this man than herself, shield or the world. A man that Loki has complete control over. This is engaging for him because it means he can dig deep into her. If he says the right thing, she'll be distraught and terrified, but like any power dynamic flip, they hit harder with the soon to be victims sitting in some level of comfort. This is her completed bargain, she's at the peak of her confidence and she's made it clear that in exchange for something, Barton must be spared. She's also provided a motivation to convince him she is telling the truth alongside a brief history topped with a desire to wipe said history of misdeeds, ones she's only alluded to. Natasha could be given the information she wants here to then reveal her lie being that she won't help Loki at all and that she merely tricked him along the way. Only Loki is a lot smarter than that and he's ready to spring his trap. Now the balance has shifted significantly. Loki has revealed he knows far more of her history than she could have accounted for, that he was just humoring her in the prior half of the conversation. He knows her worst sins, he knows Barton's worst sins, he belittles the very concept of saving him as a microscopic moment of virtue in the face of her history and he describes the effort as pathetic. Loki then strips down shield and humanity as a whole while we pan through the avengers realizing that shield has lied to them. He does however make it clear that it isn't simply her history or her organization, it's her existence alone that's enough for condemnation. He charges forward smashing her sharp build up of confidence and with his knowledge of her history as well as Barton's makes a very convincing threat of having Barton torture her himself in ways he knows will be effective. Natasha is horrified and Loki completes his counter proposal and then he'll wake just long enough to see his good work and when he screams I'll split his skull. The choice of words to split Barton's skull after his good work is complete ends a very complex and terrifying description of what he can do to her through his own puppet, the man she cares so much about. Loki has finished his interrogation, he's struck Natasha exactly where she lives scarring her for an indefinite time giving him the satisfaction he wanted from the outset. We have flipped the dynamic of power and the payoff is now complete but the scene isn't over. In Loki's complete and utter confidence of his own abilities, his own execution of juggling every last piece of information he had as well as bathing in the reaction he wanted on top of having relished in his primary victory, that of being placed on this very ship with his scepter and his goal to lay out Earth's mightiest heroes, he slipped. He further detailed the nature of his victory, the agitation and release of the monster, which as a plan is entirely close to completion. What he says is a simple jab. He's not the monster, he's the truth seer. The big green psychopath spawned from the human race is the monster and the fact that this is what he has to say in relation to Banner tells us how he views him, making certain payoffs to come that much more satisfying. Regardless, he gave away just a bit too much when celebrating. Loki hasn't yet understood what just happened, it was too quick. He's still under the impression that he won, but Natasha's new attitude doesn't match that whatsoever. And now that it's dawned on him, Loki won't even look at her as she leaves. He's now realizing what he just gave up and that his plan could be compromised as a result. That small dopamine hit of torturing Natasha wasn't even close to worth it, which completes the leverage being switched once again in one scene. It shows us exactly who these people are, two powerhouse intelligent characters at their best, acting in ways that bolster their values, progressing the plot significantly and providing introspection for them both in the future. Being capped off with what could have been an awesome catchphrase Natasha could land on anyone she defeats in this environment. Instead, it's pilfered in an attempt to evoke a better time. Imagine stealing that line for your shitty attempt at an interrogation scene, while confidently forcing Natasha to slap his face into a desk for fuck's sake, just a complete misfire. This, however, is one of Loki and Natasha's greatest scenes. It's from a story that wanted to boost them both as characters while clashing them in such a way that damage hits both sides. But most importantly, it was written by a storyteller, not a fucking chicken nugget. And it only gets stronger as the movie progresses. One could ask, how did Loki manage to fall for Natasha's ruse? How is it that she convinced him it tore her up? How did he fall for it? It was real. Loki did do the damage he thought he dealt, hence his confusion. Natasha was convincing because she felt it. She's incredibly invested in Clint, not just as a friend. He represents what gave her a chance to become a better, stronger person. A hero. Her identity is tied to him. She is, however, experienced enough to compartmentalize this. She got what she wanted, and she did what she could with the information, only later does she reconcile with what she felt. The scene is incredible because both characters were simultaneously victorious and damaged. The power levels shift throughout. These two highly skilled individuals were represented perfectly. The Avengers is one of the greatest installments of the MCU, and it's a shame that one scene from that film is better than anything Marvel has produced in years. And that is why the Loki interrogation scene is my one marvelous scene. 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