The MCU Finally Justifies Its Comic Relief With Yelena
The introduction of Florence Pugh's Yelena Belova in 2021's Black Widow marked the Marvel Cinematic Universe's first proper justification for comic relief. A quintessential element of the MCU's 27 feature films to date, humor appears in the form of characters with the purpose of counteracting serious moments and darker themes. However, the vast majority of characters like Shang-Chi's Katy, Spider-Man's Ned, and Ant-Man's Luis, fail to validate their comedic personalities. On the contrary, Yelena's appearances in both Black Widow and Hawkeye prove that the character exists as a fully fleshed-out human rather than a one-dimensional mechanism for laughs.
The adopted sister of now-deceased Avenger Natasha Romanoff, Yelena spent most of her childhood and young adult life as a Black Widow assassin under the control of General Dreykov's Red Room program. After another Widow freed her from Dreykov's chemical mind control using an antidote, Yelena ventured across the world to liberate the remaining assassins, as depicted at the beginning of Hawkeye, episode 5, «Ronin». The Disney+ series confirmed that Yelena had fallen victim to the Blip, losing five years of her life, during which Natasha's demise occurred.
Related: Hawkeye Wasted Yelena's Story — Why She Deserved More
Typically, comic relief has defined certain characters solely because the film necessitates humor to adhere to the MCU’s formula. Yelena constitutes a rare case in which her comedic side works perfectly as a coping mechanism for the trauma she has endured in her life. While Yelena drives much of Black Widow's and Hawkeye's humor, the MCU concurrently emphasizes the part of her character that suffers from her time under the Red Room's control, the Blip, and the
Read more on screenrant.com
