Jane Foster Archives - The Wide Screen

April 19, 2022

“Thor: Love And Thunder” Drops An Electrifying 1st Teaser Trailer

I’m truly sorry to all the straight guys out there who missed the memo, but Thor belongs to the gays and the girls now. And before you come at me like “what memo? I didn’t get a memo!”, well, you did, you just didn’t realize at the time that Cate Blanchett strutting around in a black bodysuit and antlers throughout the entirety of Thor: Ragnarok meant that the straights had officially lost custody of the franchise. It’s okay though, you had your shot, you gave us those two depressingly heteronormative Thor movies that nobody liked or watched, now it’s time for you to move over and let Taika Waititi show you how it’s done, AGAIN.

Waititi has been on a roll recently, and it’s in no small part thanks to the loyal queer fanbase he’s amassed. A fourth season of his extremely pansexual paranormal comedy series What We Do In The Shadows has already been shot, and will likely release later this year. The first season of HBO Max’s Our Flag Means Death, a show about queer pirates in the 18th century which Waititi produced and stars in, has been dominating the streaming charts. And Thor: Love And Thunder is only a hundred days from release, and looks to be another surefire hit for Waititi and Marvel with its colorful 80’s aesthetics, zany new characters, and heavy focus on romances – including some queer ones.

There are at least three canonically queer characters in this film, and of those three, King Valkyrie is the one whom we know for a fact will be confirmed as queer onscreen. Technically, actress Tessa Thompson has been playing her as bisexual since her debut in Thor: Ragnarok, but explicit evidence of her bisexuality was left on the cutting-room floor because apparently it distracted from vital exposition…which sounds an awful lot like an excuse to me, but thankfully, King Valkyrie will return in a much larger role in Thor: Love And Thunder, and Thompson has stated as far back as 2018 that her character “needs to find her queen”.

Unsurprisingly, there have been several willing volunteers for that position already, including Jaimie Alexander (the MCU’s Lady Sif) and Brie Larson (whose Captain Marvel is heavily implied to be queer as it is). But in the brief glimpse we catch of King Valkyrie in the first teaser trailer for Love And Thunder, she appears to be merely daydreaming of her many suitors. Dressed in a fashionable black pinstripe suit, she leans back in the throne of New Asgard and zones out while being heckled by ambassadors from other nations. I confess, I’m actually interested to learn more about how New Asgard interacts with the world (i.e. do they participate in Eurovision?), but I would have liked to see her in a less formal setting for this trailer, perhaps even on a date.

Then there’s Korg and Peter Quill, and in both cases the comic versions of these characters are canonically queer while the MCU versions are not…or at least, not yet. To be fair, Quill was only finally confirmed as bisexual in the comics within the last two years, so it’s not like the Guardians Of The Galaxy movies released in 2014 and 2017 had any precedent for making the character bi (not that that should have stopped them, obviously). But now that such a precedent exists, it’s impossible for me to watch this teaser and simply ignore or overlook the implications behind Peter Quill’s subtly flirtatious interactions with Thor.

If only it weren’t equally impossible to be optimistic, given Disney and Marvel’s track-record when it comes to LGBTQ+ representation. Trust me, I desperately want to read way too much into Quill and Thor’s dialogue in this teaser, and the recent reports that Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3 filmed scenes in a gay bar, and the tweets about Quill being bi that Guardians director James Gunn liked last year, but I can’t, or at least I don’t want to, because at the end of the day Quill is a male action hero in a franchise where male action heroes are designed to be salivated over by straight men specifically.

Also, with Chris Pratt continuing to attend and defend an evangelical church that supported the torture of LGBTQ+ people under the guise of “conversion therapy”, I’m not sure if I actually trust him to portray Peter Quill’s bisexuality well, nor do I think it would be received well by the bisexual community regardless. Yeah, it would be cool to have a lead male character in a Marvel movie be revealed as bi, but is it worth it if we have to put up with Chris Pratt either complaining bitterly about it, or worse, using it as a flimsy shield against criticisms of him and his homophobic church? I think I might rather just keep the two queer male action heroes we currently have in the MCU proper.

As for Korg, the friendly rock-giant has previously appeared in Thor: Ragnarok and Avengers: Endgame, but what’s never been mentioned – even in passing – is the fact that he’s a gay character in the comics. I believe there’s a slim chance that this will be remedied in Thor: Love And Thunder through some off-hand line of dialogue, although Waititi has already confirmed that Korg will not have a love interest in the new movie.

I mentioned that there at least three canonically queer characters in Love And Thunder, and we’ve now gone through all of those – but there’s a few more that I want to talk about, because we know from the teaser trailer that Thor will visit Mount Olympus, the domain of the Greek gods, and…well, if you know anything about Greek mythology, you know where I’m going with this. For those who don’t know, the Greek gods were unapologetically pansexual, long before the word even existed. That includes Zeus, who is set to make his MCU debut in Love And Thunder, portrayed by Russell Crowe. There’s a quick shot of him in the teaser trailer, dressed all in gold and holding aloft a lightning-bolt while addressing the gods of Mount Olympus.

Unfortunately for Zeus and probably 99.9% of everyone assembled in that crowd shot, the antagonist of Love And Thunder is none other than Gorr the God-Butcher, who has made it his mission to slaughter every deity from every pantheon, no matter how minor. But even if Zeus doesn’t make it out of this movie alive (and let’s be honest, he probably won’t), there are theories and credible rumors that his son, Hercules, will live to fight another day. Granted, there were also rumors he was the lead character of Eternals, which turned out to be…not true, but he’s the type of character I could easily envision first appearing in a Love And Thunder post-credits scene, clambering out of the rubble of Olympus and turning dramatically towards the camera.

He’s also bisexual in the Marvel Comics – and no, before you ask, I’m not referring to the parallel universe version of Hercules who dated a parallel universe version of Wolverine back in the mid-2010’s, I’m actually referring to the Earth 616 version of Hercules (i.e. the main version of the character) who recently started dating Noh-Varr and was implied to have slept with Northstar as far back as 2010. That Hercules.

So we’ve established that most of the supporting cast in Love And Thunder is, if not canonically queer, then at the very least potentially queer. But what about Thor himself? What about Jane Foster? Do they both just give off intense amounts of bisexual energy, or is there more to it than that?

To the best of my knowledge, neither character is queer in the comics, and while this should probably go without saying, the MCU versions of the characters have never been depicted as queer either. They were written to be star-crossed lovers in the first two Thor films, although it was never entirely clear why – Natalie Portman appeared to be bored out of her mind every time she had to act alongside Chris Hemsworth, and Hemsworth just looked uncomfortable and indifferent. But at the time, every other male action hero in the MCU had an intelligent girlfriend to counterbalance “his brawn with her brains”, and Thor apparently needed one too.

Natalie Portman wisely got out of the franchise before a male director could kill off her character for shock value, and the in-universe excuse for her absence in Thor: Ragnarok was that Jane broke up with Thor somewhere along the line, and it was messy, and they don’t talk to each other anymore. I don’t think they’ll get back together in Love And Thunder, either. There will probably be some romantic and sexual tension between them still (although Portman and Hemsworth need to put some effort into delivering on that front), but I feel pretty certain that by the end of this film the two characters will part amicably, as friends or frenemies, after finally acknowledging and owning up to their mistakes.

There’s a distinct possibility that Jane will also become Valkyrie’s queen, which could be interesting; we know next to nothing about her, so who’s to say she’s not bisexual? That could be something she discovered after breaking up with Thor, or it could be part of why she chose to break up with him in the first place. Thor has been on a journey of self-discovery these past few years, so he can certainly relate.

In fact, Thor might be able to relate on multiple levels. In that aforementioned flirty moment with Peter Quill, it’s Thor who repeatedly tries to lock eyes with Quill while he’s talking about…looking people you love in the eyes. Quill breaks eye-contact and clarifies that he wasn’t talking about himself, leading to an awkward and very intriguing moment in which Thor bites his lip, looks off to the side, and mumbles “What? Just listening”. It might just be a joke that uses homoeroticism as a punchline, which would be disappointing, but fans got very excited about the idea of Thor having a crush on Quill.

(That being said, the claim that was going around social media yesterday that “Thor is canonically pansexual in the comics” is totally false, and I don’t know where that originated but I couldn’t find any source for it. You want to headcanon him as pansexual, be my guest, but don’t go around saying that he is and praising Marvel for it or attacking other people for saying he’s bisexual).

So is Thor: Love And Thunder about to be the gayest movie that Marvel has ever made? You’d better believe it. Is the bar for mainstream LGBTQ+ representation depressingly low? Absolutely. Is this a textbook example of fans (like myself) creating the representation we seek, and doing Marvel’s job for them? Possibly. I have a limited but not insubstantial amount of faith in Taika Waititi to give us representation onscreen, or at the very least to tell us what he wasn’t allowed to show us, and I hope Marvel’s promises regarding better LGBTQ+ representation aren’t entirely empty, but it’s difficult not to be cynical, and I understand the benefits of being cynical.

I won’t say “wait to see the movie”, because I hate that studios are able to lure fans into the theater on the promise of representation alone, but for now I guess let’s just hope for the best.

Trailer Rating: 9.5/10

September 22, 2021

“What If…?” Episode 7 Teaches Thor A Good Lesson – Don’t Mess With Captain Marvel

**SPOILERS FOR WHAT IF…? AHEAD!**

One of the great things about anthologies, Marvel’s What If…? being one of them, is that you (usually) never have to spend too long in a story setting that bores you, or with characters who grate on your nerves, before you’re on your way again. That’s not to say the next installment will always be good, but variety keeps things interesting – and I’m finding that’s especially true of What If…?, which at least finds ways to shake things up each week, even if the series has yet to reach another high-point on the level of episode four and has declined markedly in quality in its last two episodes.

It’s a bit of a shame, too, because with a little more focus and a few touch-ups to the script, I think What If…? could surely have done something more interesting with a character as wonderfully ridiculous as Party Thor (Chris Hemsworth), the unofficial nickname of this Variant of the MCU’s Thor who comes to Midgard to escape his kingly duties on Asgard and ends up hosting an intergalactic get-together based out of Las Vegas that threatens to tear the earth apart.

That intriguing concept harkens back to actual Norse mythology, which is a lot more weird and trippy than I think most MCU stans realize (as evidenced by all the MCU Loki fans horrified that he could ever be attracted to himself, as if mythological Loki didn’t turn into a mare so he could…uh, have “diplomatic relations” with a stallion and give birth to that stallion’s babies). The MCU’s version of Thor has never been much like the mythological character who would go out partying with Loki (Tom Hiddleston) and the giants of Jotunheim, only to find himself trying to drink the ocean out of a horn, so it’s pretty awesome as a fan of both to see some crossover there, and even spot a couple callbacks to the myths.

But these are the MCU versions of Thor and Loki we’re dealing with, and that’s not a bad thing by any means. For one thing, it allows the scope of today’s What If…? to expand well beyond Asgard and Midgard. There are cameos, some sizable and some of the blink-and-you’ll-miss-it variety, from a bunch of cosmic characters plucked mostly from Thor: Ragnarok and the Guardians Of The Galaxy franchise. Jeff Goldblum pops up as The Grandmaster (and “release the foam” is instantly immortalized as one of the character’s most iconic lines); Karen Gillan, Taika Waititi, and Clancy Brown reprise their roles as Nebula, Korg, and the Norse deity Surtur, respectively, while Mantis, Rocket Raccoon, Yondu, Ayesha and Valkyrie all have background roles.

The only character missing from the crowd, or at least the only character I missed, is Hela. The Nexus Event of this whole timeline is Odin returning Loki to his birth-parents in Jotunheim and raising Thor as an only child, but technically Thor’s sister Hela should still exist in this timeline regardless – and personally, I think What If…? missed out on a great opportunity by not having her living in Vegas and running her own casino when Thor arrives. It’s an actual storyline in the comics, people! Forget Party Thor, we could have had Party Hela!

Unfortunately, even with this incredible assortment of characters all onscreen at once like it’s the Endgame of parties (which technically it’s about to be if they don’t all leave), the story still finds a way to drag…perhaps because it’s centered around a romance between Thor and Jane Foster (Natalie Portman) that didn’t work seven years ago when the MCU tried to make that a thing, and still doesn’t work now. In a franchise in which Steve Rogers once kissed his dead girlfriend’s niece, and where the most believable romance is between a woman and a sentient computer program, Thor and Jane still somehow stands out as one of the MCU’s low-points when it comes to love-stories.

It wasn’t just that Chris Hemsworth and Natalie Portman had no chemistry, either, or that every time they shared the screen Hemsworth looked vaguely uncomfortable and Portman seemed bored out of her mind. It was more so that the early Thor movies hinged on the notion that their characters were soulmates being forced apart by the universe itself, and nothing about their painfully apathetic performances seemed to back that up. At least in What If…?, Hemsworth and Portman both seem more enthusiastic about the whole business and Hemsworth is leaning into his strengths as a comedian, which makes their interactions amusing to watch if not particularly romantic, but there’s still nothing that explains why these two are supposedly fated to fall in love.

Frankly, I was far more interested in the high-speed romance between Darcy Lewis (Kat Dennings) and Howard the Duck (voiced by Seth Green) that unfolds across just a handful of scenes, in which they go on a date, get married in Vegas by an Elvis impersonator, and are last seen squabbling like an old couple. It’s the kind of outlandish pairing that makes absolutely no sense on paper, but in execution it just works. It’s ridiculous, yet completely in-character for both Howard and Darcy, and I bought their chemistry and mutual attraction for each other.

With subplots like that, the heavy focus on Thor and Jane’s relationship feels underwhelming, and the happy ending to their love story tacked on at the end of the episode is so contrived that the episode itself immediately turns around and forces a new problem to arise: one involving What If…?‘s ultimate big bad, revealed here for the first time – an alternate version of the genocidal cyborg Ultron who’s apparently succeeded in downloading his consciousness into the Vision’s body and then also conveniently picked up some Infinity Stones along the way. As we near the end of the season, I hope to learn more about this Ultron in next week’s episode.

I also hope that we get to see more of Carol Danvers (voiced by Alexandra Daniels) before the season’s end. She has a pivotal role in this week’s episode, summoned from the heavens by S.H.I.E.L.D. to put an end to Thor’s partying – allowing for an effective if slightly shallow commentary on how women are often depicted in media as being “no fun”. I enjoyed seeing Carol trade punches with Thor in an epic battle spanning several continents, and I admired her capacity for understanding and empathy; but I’m still not sure how I feel about her – and most of the women around Thor, for that matter – having to teach him lessons about responsibility and common decency.

Oh, and as for who would win a duel between Thor and Carol, the episode doesn’t fully answer that question which has long riled up MCU fan-forums. The two cosmic heroes seem pretty evenly matched in their first fight: Carol’s power-absorption protects her from Thor’s lightning, and she’s stunned but not seriously injured by a blow to the head from Mjolnir – ultimately, it’s only when Thor uses the hammer to pin her down that she’s defeated. But Carol reveals later that she’s unable to use her full power on earth without making a considerable dent in the planet’s surface, and when she does lure Thor out to Siberia to try and fight him more freely, the fight seems to be turning in her favor before it’s interrupted. Sorry, Thor, but I think Carol wins this one; and someday I’d love to see a fight between the two where neither has to hold back.

Episode Rating: 7.5/10

December 13, 2020

Thor: Love And Thunder Villain Gorr The God-Butcher Is Absolutely Terrifying

While it certainly wasn’t the biggest reveal from the crowded Disney Investors Meeting on Thursday, the confirmation of the Thor: Love And Thunder main villain was still pretty huge news for Marvel Comics fans – and exactly the type of thing I couldn’t wait to write about, because I love few things more than extensively researching obscure Marvel deep lore. And Gorr the God-Butcher is one of the most fascinating villains in the comics: a terrifying, complex, tragic Shakespearean figure…who just happens to also be an immortal mutant alien symbiotically fused with a cosmic death sword.

Academy Award-winner Christian Bale is officially attached to play Gorr, joining Chris Hemsworth’s Thor, Natalie Portman’s Mighty Thor, and Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie, in the fourth (and until further notice, final) installment in the long-running franchise. We still don’t know how director Taika Waititi was able to land an actor of Bale’s caliber for this role, but I have a few guesses. Firstly, it goes without saying that Waititi is one of the most creative, inventive, and unique filmmakers working today. He was able to nab Cate Blanchett for the super-campy role of the goddess Hela in Thor: Ragnarok, before he was even fully established in Hollywood. Secondly, methinks the character of Gorr could be achieved at least partly via practical effects, as we know Bale loves his transformative roles, and physically becoming a literal alien could be his most shocking metamorphosis yet. And thirdly, the character of Gorr has a fascinating backstory that seems like juicy material for a dramatic actor.

Gorr first appeared in 2013, during Jason Aaron’s tenure writing Thor. The ageless alien being hails from a tumultuous planet traumatized by eternal war, famine, plague, and chaos. On this planet, as you might expect, the population spends most of their time praying to their gods for aid – to no avail, as Gorr personally loses his parents, wife, and all but one of his children to various disasters. Having lost all faith in the hope of gods, Gorr flees into the wilderness with his last surviving son, only to accidentally discover that the gods are real after coming across Knull, a primordial deity of darkness. Gorr’s lack of faith turns into an undying hatred of all gods who ignore the prayers of their worshipers, and he quickly kills Knull and takes All-Black the Necrosword, Knull’s powerful weapon, as his own. Armed with All-Black (quite literally, since the sword is symbiotic and fuses into his body), Gorr travels the universe, hunting gods and slaughtering them one-by-one. He meets his match in Thor, whom he initially tries to kill in the 9th Century and many times afterwards – but the cause of his downfall is none other than his own son, Agar, who tells Gorr that, in his quest to exterminate the gods, he has himself become one: the God of Hypocrisy.

Because we’re talking about comics here, Gorr doesn’t stay dead for long. His spirit lives on in All-Black, and he gets resurrected again, pursuing Thor and Loki for vengeance. But his best story remains his original appearance, which gives him a surprising amount of depth, and provides the perfect basis for Thor: Love And Thunder‘s adaptation of the character. Knowing Taika Waititi, I expect him to give Gorr just a little more flair than in the comics (perhaps a morbid sense of humor), but that’s not the only thing that might have to change.

For one thing, we’ll necessarily have to see Gorr kill some gods for him to appear truly threatening – but most of the Asgardian pantheon (with the exception of Thor, Loki, and Valkyrie) are already dead, thanks to Hela’s purge of Asgard during Ragnarok. A possible solution to this problem would be to bring back Hela, and have her fill the Knull role and/or be one of Gorr’s targets. There’s a storyline in the comics where she sets up a casino in Las Vegas and hosts extravagant parties for villains: that sounds exactly like something Taika Waititi would love, and it would make for an awesome set-piece if Gorr crashed the party and dueled Hela to the death. We could also see Gorr go after the Eternals, who will have been introduced to the MCU by that point: they’re basically gods anyway, and so far they’re most closely linked to the Thor mythos in the comics. I’ve always wondered how they’ll be incorporated into the broader universe, but having Thor team up with them to defeat Gorr is definitely one possibility. It’s also been theorized that Gorr will be tracking Star-Lord, who is technically the demigod son of a Celestial (remember that major plotpoint that’s never been addressed since?), which would explain why Chris Pratt supposedly joined the cast a few months ago.

I also doubt that Gorr and Thor will have as long a history together as they did in the comics. MCU Thor has been alive for over a thousand years, but it seems completely out of character for him to have battled Gorr during his youth and won (he was a boisterous, hotheaded idiot right up until the first Avengers movie). And having Gorr be one of Odin’s many secrets feels redundant. It would make a lot more sense for Gorr to first appear in the modern day (perhaps his family were snapped out of existence by Thanos, and he sets off on his vengeful murder spree before they get snapped back by Tony Stark?).

Even with these changes, the story of Gorr is still a great one: and I think it’s pretty clear why Christian Bale would be attracted to this role. The God-Butcher could easily rank alongside Thanos, Killmonger, Hela and Loki as the greatest MCU villains of all time if done well: and if this is the final Thor movie (I’m not saying it is, but it could be), then it only makes sense to go out on a high note.

What do you think? Are you excited for Christian Bale’s version of Gorr? Share your own thoughts, theories, and opinions, in the comments below!

February 14, 2020February 14, 2020

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked!

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has (in)famously had a hard time establishing romantic relationships between its characters: even the few love stories that have helped to define the overarching story have sometimes gone through ups and downs, or simply collided headfirst with a brick wall and died (looking at you, Thor & Jane). And yet they keep trying to master the same old boy-meets-girl (or Norse-god-meets-girl, or boy-meets-alien, or computer-program-meets-girl) formula. That’s why, in celebration of Valentine’s Day, I’ve set myself a challenge: trying to find the ten most romantic, endearing, adorable couples in the MCU and ranking them.

Disclaimer: “ships” or non-canon pairings aren’t being considered on this list because that would be cheating – most MCU “ships” are at least ten times better than the majority of actual onscreen pairings. It’s simply not fair to compare.

10: Thor & Jane Foster.

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked! 1 — hollywoodreporter.com

These two had something that looked like potential – I mean, if you squinted really hard. From the moment that Thor, the Norse God of Thunder and rightful heir to the throne of Asgard, crash-landed in the American Southwest, upsetting one of Jane Foster’s pseudo-scientific experiments, Marvel tried to convince audiences that a grand and glorious epic love-story for the ages was brewing – but all the magic (or “what your ancestors call magic”) words in the Marvel mythos couldn’t force Chris Hemsworth and Natalie Portman to look more than remotely disinterested in each other. And after Thor: The Dark World failed to turn up the heat, or really do anything at all, Portman had finally had enough: she quit the MCU, and Jane Foster was subsequently written out of the story. In Thor: Ragnarok, it was briefly mentioned that she broke up with the Thunder God offscreen – an uncomfortably awkward conclusion to what was supposed to be a cornerstone of Thor’s entire arc.

9: Stephen Strange & Christine Palmer.

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked! 2 — marvelcinematicuniverse.fandom.com

I’m actually tempted to move this couple ever so slightly further up the list, because while they’re not exactly memorable, they’re also probably not as bad and/or boring as you remembered. Dr. Stephen Strange, a snobbish, arrogant surgeon, wasn’t just the on-and-off boyfriend of Dr. Christine Palmer – he was also her work-partner, and it was mentioned (though never really elaborated on) that the two had even pioneered an important new surgical technique, making the couple basically equal. And after Strange’s run-in with karma, it was Palmer who tried to help him recover his strength and rebuild his life: their heated argument about Strange’s future is the most powerful scene in the Doctor Strange movie, and carries a lot of emotional weight. Unfortunately, Rachel McAdams’ character basically fades into the background after that, and apart from being privy to a battle on the astral plane and trying (unsuccessfully) to save the Ancient One’s life, she really has nothing more to do in the story. And she’s not returning for the sequel, so I guess that’s the end of that.

8: Peter Quill & Gamora.

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked! 3 — screencrush.com

I don’t really like either Peter Quill (a.k.a. Star-Lord, an interstellar pirate armed with braggadocio, semi-Celestial powers that have proved to be entirely inconsequential outside of his own movies, and an impressive playlist of golden oldies), or Gamora (a.k.a. The Most Dangerous Woman In The Galaxy, who never actually lived up to that title before her untimely death at the hands of ~~male screenwriters who didn’t know what else to do with her~~ her own father, Thanos): nonetheless, I have to admit they had a spark of chemistry in both Guardians Of The Galaxy movies – and their interactions in Avengers: Infinity War, during which Gamora nearly convinced Quill to kill her (long story), are pretty emotional. There was something there! It wasn’t much, maybe, but it also wasn’t not there – much to the dismay of Thor & Peter Quill shippers everywhere. But in the end, Quill failed (because doesn’t he always?), Gamora got tossed off a cliff, and here we are with nothing left of their relationship but a sad trail of bubbles.

7: Natasha Romanoff & Bruce Banner.

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked! 4 — thedigitalwise.com

I like Avengers: Age Of Ultron. I know it’s unpopular to say this, but it’s honestly the best Avengers movie – not only because it references the events of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D., but also because it successfully balances almost all of the main characters while still being able to add a couple new ones to the mix. There’s a cohesive plot, the stakes are raised, and the Avengers get to interact with each other on a more personal, intimate level than ever before. And then there’s Natasha Romanoff’s random relationship with Bruce Banner – while it’s not a bad idea, and they make a cute couple, the basis for their coupling up is based on the problematic idea that they’re both “monsters”: Bruce, because he transforms into a giant green killing machine; Natasha, because she’s…infertile? The messaging is weird and kind of sexist, especially since it would have been way easier to make Natasha’s murderous past with the KGB the reason for her guilt and self-loathing. It’s a shame, because Natasha actually did have better interactions with Bruce than she ever had with her former love interest, Clint Barton, but for better or worse their story arc was completely abandoned in Avengers: Infinity War.

6: T’Challa & Nakia.

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked! 5 — popsugar.au

While there’s certainly an argument to be made that T’Challa, the catsuit-wearing guardian of the African nation of Wakanda, is slightly more low-key and subdued than many of his co-stars in Black Panther (let’s face it, he doesn’t have Okoye’s fiery energy, Killmonger’s smoldering charisma, or M’Baku’s macabre humor), there can be no denying that his relationship with Wakandan secret agent/humanitarian Nakia is super cute. The two are a power couple, with both characters having genuine hero moments – Nakia even briefly diverts the main focus of the film away from T’Challa, and considers becoming the Black Panther herself. By the end of the film, she’s also working around the world to help extend Wakandan aid to those in need. And when they’re onscreen together, they’re presented as a healthy, sturdy relationship that doesn’t have to rely on drama, troubling gender dynamics, or sarcastic banter to be interesting. They’re basically #CoupleGoals, and I love them.

5: Wanda Maximoff & The Vision.

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked! 6 — polygon.com

Ah, the tragic story of the computer program who became a man…once, for no apparent reason, and never did so again. The Vision, a sentient computer program outfitted with a cool new body (that, unfortunately for him, came along with the Mind Stone, one of the most coveted objects in the galaxy), didn’t really show any signs of attraction to the troubled witch, Wanda Maximoff, until Captain America: Civil War, but when their romance finally kicked into gear, and the two began to bond over spicy food, things got good – and then immediately got weird again, when Wanda blasted Vision through a floor, before suddenly…ending up on the run with him in Scotland? Where Vision was suddenly able to turn into a human man, but only did so once, for reasons that were never explained? Yeah, so there’s some serious gaps in what we actually know about their relationship, but at least it ended on a strong note, with Wanda having to brutally murder her lover in an attempt to destroy the Mind Stone before Thanos could get to it, only to watch Thanos use the Time Stone to reverse all her hard work, murder Vision again, and use the Stones to wipe out half the galaxy, including Wanda herself. If it’s any consolation, the upcoming WandaVision series on Disney+ will feature Wanda resurrecting her dead partner, only to have him presumably die once again when her entire reality inevitably comes crashing down around her. Cheerful, am I right?

4: Scott Lang & Hope Van Dyne.

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked! 7 — hollywoodreporter.com

Technically, there have been two canon MCU power couples that call themselves Ant-Man and The Wasp: Hope Van Dyne’s parents, Hank Pym and Janet Van Dyne, and then Hope herself and her partner, reformed burglar/single father/world’s best grandma, Scott Lang. But the latter couple has the edge on its predecessor, mostly because Janet doesn’t actually show up until the end of the second Ant-Man film, and most of her flashbacks with Hank were cut out of the movie anyway. Scott and Hope share the spotlight (and the title-card) in Ant-Man And The Wasp, which focuses almost entirely on their relationship – and their exchanges of playful, witty banter, coupled with their fidelity and focus on family, make them one of the most endearing couples in the MCU.

3: Steve Rogers & Peggy Carter.

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked! 8 — themarysue.com

Specifically, their relationship in the first three Captain America films, before Avengers: Endgame happened. In the beginning, scrawny new recruit Steve Rogers and fast-talking, no-nonsense commanding officer Peggy Carter were actually quite a sweet pairing: they both had character arcs, and agency in their own stories. There was a quaint little 1940’s love story between them, but Peggy, by virtue of being in the military, wasn’t forced to play the damsel-in-distress or grieving-girlfriend-on-the-home-front roles: and in the post-war era, after Steve went down in the frigid Antarctic Ocean and was lost, she picked up her life and moved on, founding S.H.I.E.L.D. and starting a family. Her relationship with Steve after his resurrection from the ice was deeply emotional and interesting, and it was tragic when she passed away. But then to essentially reverse all the complexities of their post-The First Avenger relationship by having Steve go back in time and start all over with her, making her essentially a consolation prize for Steve after he failed to move on with his life, thus preventing her from moving on with hers? No, just no.

2: Tony Stark & Virginia “Pepper” Potts.

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked! 9 — appocalypse.co

They’re the MCU’s original duo: how could they not come in near the top of the list? Tony was a sarcastic, cynical mess of a human being; a war-profiteer who didn’t care one iota about the countless people killed daily by his weapons of mass destruction; Pepper was the very opposite, a cool, collected woman with savvy business skills and a friendly disposition. It’s a trope, and a tired one at that. But their relationship evolved into so much more than that – Tony became Iron Man, and Pepper took over as CEO of Stark Industries. They constructed the Avengers Tower in New York City. In the five years after Avengers: Infinity War, they got married and had a daughter. In Avengers: Endgame, where they even got to fight in battle alongside each other, their decade-long relationship came to an end with Tony Stark’s tragic death. In that final moment, as the former “Merchant of Death” gave up his life to save the world, Pepper stayed beside him and her face was the last thing he ever saw. I’m not crying: you’re crying.

1: Leopold Fitz & Jemma Simmons.

The Ten Most Romantic Couples In The MCU: Ranked! 10 — cinemablend.com

Yes, I cheated! Fitz and Simmons, or “Fitzsimmons” as they’re more commonly known among the fandom, are not technically members of the MCU: they come from the Marvel TV division, where they made their debut on Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. and have endured through six grueling, torturous seasons of hardship, personal loss, tragedy and pure, wholesome romance. While they started out as the team’s two bumbling, socially-awkward scientists, it didn’t take long before the universe’s vendetta against them resulted in them standing up for S.H.I.E.L.D., and for each other, in incredible ways. Their tense, frantic struggle to figure their way out of an airtight box at the bottom of the ocean (long story) was one of the highlights of Season 1, as it showed just how powerful the two are as a team – so of course they were then split up. Jemma became an undercover spy, got eaten by a space monolith, was transported to another planet and had to survive on her own, fell in love with an astronaut who turned into an evil alien god, was possessed by the Kree, was possibly hinted to be bisexual (come on, we all know she had a thing for Daisy), and even met and defeated the demonic personification of her self-doubt: Leo lost his ability to communicate for a long period of time and became delusional, was possibly hinted to be bisexual (come on, we all know he had a thing for Mac), became a dashing secret agent, met his evil HYDRA doppelganger, fell in love with HYDRA’s cyborg overlord, and then got stuck in two different time-periods at once, which resulted in him dying but still being alive and yet somehow a space pirate in both timelines…it’s a wacky and confusing series, but their love for each other, which persists even against all odds, has always been at the heart of the story, and I would be lying if I didn’t say they’re the most romantic couple in what used to technically be part of (or at least adjacent to) the MCU.

So what do you think of my top ten, and would you have chosen differently? Did I leave your favorite couple off my list? Share your thoughts in the comments below!