halfamoon is a community that dedicates a fortnight to celebrating female characters. I didn’t get all my ducks in a row this year and I'm not as ready as I'd like to be.


I intended to make a post to celebrate all things Natasha Romanoff (movie canon) and I have about a half-dozen gen or Natasha-centric fic recs but I would love more of your favourites. I would also love any meta people have written that I can link to (or quote, with your permission).



I think Natasha is extremely undervalued by large parts of fandom/movie critics/the 'average' male fan who see her as pretty eye candy. I think this ignores how large a role she played in the Avengers. She's not flashy, she's not looking for the spotlight or leadership role, so it's understandable that people wouldn't call her the 'star', but she certainly is the person who pushes the plot forward the most.

Badass Things Natasha Did in The Avengers:

- she has herself purposefully 'captured' in order to lower the defences of her captors so they will reveal information to her. She shows that she could've broken free at any moment and was only there because she needed something from them.

- she tracks down Bruce, lures him out to the outskirts of town and convinces him to come in to SHIELD, showing an impressive level of calm considering the situation and her knowledge of what he can become. We see that she is not unflappable. That she is scared of certain things (yet is not scared of Loki).

- she is able to joke and put both Steve and Bruce at ease, starting up an easy camaraderie that will be essential for team dynamics later

- she subverts Loki's expectations, coming to him first, before the torture he expects. He had her cast in the role of good cop, someone to arrive as a false spectre of salvation to get him to confide in her when he is weak - he underestimates her and Natasha uses this assumption against him, she uses what he believes he knows about her relationship with Clint against him (by acting upset and desperate, by intimating that she might consider trading the world for one man)

- she purposefully allows herself to look weak, broken and scared. When she is at her most 'vulnerable' is when Loki is at his most confident and he lets slip that unleashing the Hulk is his plan

- when Natasha hears that Barton is on board, she knows that she has to step up and go after him because no one else can. She does this despite having recently been chased down by the Hulk and hearing from Loki how he plans for Barton to kill her 'in every way she fears most', she shows incredible courage when she moves from where she's huddled and stands up

- Natasha single-handedly kicks Loki out of Barton's brain

- Natasha hitches a ride on an alien flying ship, steering it to the top of Stark Tower where she then uses the sceptre to close the portal and SAVING THE DAY

Conclusion: Natasha is the real hero of this film, the unsung hero - just the way she likes it.

Okay, but what about her characterization? With such a large ensemble cast we only get glimpses of Natasha's character (perhaps because it's all she's willing to show us). We know that she is a person who plays things close to the chest (but is not robotic or awkward, she is a social chameleon, adapting to any situation and able to joke with strangers easily) we get a hint of her motives, of her past and an explanation for WHY she fights to save the world.

She has just as tragic back-story as any of the Avengers, but it will never be explored in more depth (unless we get a Black Widow movie) because while Natasha uses her vulnerabilities to manipulate or extract information from others (friends and foes alike), she is a very liquid character and it’s hard to know what to believe.

We know that she started as a young girl, that she made a name for herself with unsavoury means, that SHIELD wanted her dead, but Barton made a different call. But by the time of The Avengers, she seems to hold Fury’s complete trust and seems to be doing her best at hiding her distress at Barton’s disappearance.

We learn that she has also suffered from mind-control/brainwashing and has survived, although it has become something that is now always part of her now.

So send me links to your Natasha-love! Meta, speculation, fic recs is all welcome and I will do my best to properly attribute everything to it's source.

Oh, and check out halfamoon if you have the time!

[Mods, let me know if you want me to edit the tags for this post, I wasn't sure what to use]