This image features Belova decked-out in her white battle gear, which includes the utility vest that many believe Natasha winds up wearing in earlier Marvel movies (later in the MCU timeline).

There’s speculation that Yelena will ultimately take up the mantle of Black Widow and replace Romanoff as a member of The Avengers. There is some comic book precedent for this, of course, but in the source material Belova also goes on to work with S.H.I.E.L.D., Vanguard and HYDRA, so it remains to be seen how things play out in this film.

Check out the new shot of Pugh as Yelena Belova below along with the previously released cards, and ler us know what you think.

Simply click on the next button below!

Yelena Belova

Florence Pugh will play Belova in Marvel’s first (and most likely only) solo Black Widow movie. She has previoulsy gained acclaim for her performances in the likes of WWE wrestling biopic Fighting With My Family and Ari Aster’s Midsommar.

Taskmaster

We still know very little about Taskmaster or how he’ll factor into the plot. It’s believed that O-T Fagbenle will play him, but that has yet to be confirmed and could simply be misdirection. One outlandish theory claims that it might be Jeremy Renner’s Clint Barton under the mask, but that seems more like wishful thinking to us

Black Widow

“In Marvel Studios’ action-packed spy thriller “Black Widow,” Natasha Romanoff, aka Black Widow, confronts the darker parts of her ledger when a dangerous conspiracy with ties to her past arises. Pursued by a force that will stop at nothing to bring her down, Natasha must deal with her history as a spy and the broken relationships left in her wake long before she became an Avenger. Scarlett Johansson reprises her role as Natasha/Black Widow, Florence Pugh stars as Yelena, David Harbour portrays Alexei/The Red Guardian, and Rachel Weisz is Melina. Directed by Cate Shortland and produced by Kevin Feige, “Black Widow”—the first film in Phase Four of the Marvel Cinematic Universe—hits U.S. theaters on May 1, 2020.” –Marvel Studios.”

Black Widow also stars William Hurt, Ray Winstone and Olivier Richters. The movie hits theaters on May 1st. Check out the recent extended teaser below, and let us know if you’re looking forward to the movie in the comments.

However, it doesn’t sound like he’s spoken to Kevin Feige and company about the role (at least, not yet).

The moment the Fantastic Four receive their powers should be every bit as weird and grotesque as what we see here, but their transformation in the movie was safe and visually boring.
 

This is also far more comic accurate as we see Reed, Sue, Ben, and Johnny bombarded by actual cosmic rays moments before their lives are changed forever (we need to see this in the MCU). 
 

Reed’s lab looked pretty cool on the big screen, but the budget and technology at the time didn’t really allow Story to push the boundaries as much as he probably would have liked. 
 

The same goes for the design of the Baxter Building itself and so we ended up with a pretty normal looking skyscraper, albeit with a landing pad for the team’s Fantasticar. 
 

That appears to be the chamber Reed planned on using to transform The Thing back into Ben Grimm, but, as we know from the movie itself, that simply wasn’t meant to be. 
 

It’s widely believed that the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s version of the Fantastic Four will end up moving into the one-time Avengers Tower and that makes sense for a lot of reasons. 
 

Doctor Doom clearly wasn’t always going to be coated in metal, as we see here that he also crashed back to Earth but got horribly burned in the process, thereby explaining why he would don a suit of armour to cover his scarred visage. 
 

Another look into the home of the Fantastic Four. There’s a reason this team is called “Marvel’s First Family” and these movies did their best to explore what that meant for the heroes. 
 

Making Victor Von Doom a businessman was honestly kind of lame, but this office does look pretty awesome and suitably imposing for a man of his stature. 
 

The fact that the movies included the Fantasticar is definitely a bonus and something they deserve credit for, especially as it was something much harder to pull off back in 2005 and 2007. 
 

Here, we see the team being chased down by the military as they presumably weren’t overly happy with these heroes also taking to the skies in order protect the world. 
 

These designs are all really impressive, but did you know that the Fantasticar was also meant to appear in Josh Trank’s movie? Unfortunately, it ended up being cut as a result of reshoots. 
 

Well, this is a pretty unique take on Doctor Doom! The armour covering his face is amazingly intricate but not something visual effects would have been able to pull off back in 2005. 
 

These costumes are very mid-2000s and The Thing…well, he just looks a little odd! Regardless, these silver and blue suits could have worked, but the mostly comic accurate versions we got looked solid on screen. 
 

Again, these are definitely unique and clearly from the very early stages of development. When Marvel Studios redesigns the team, it will be interesting to see whether they go down the comic accurate route or totally reinvent them. 
 

This isn’t the most exciting piece of concept art in this gallery, but it was clearly meant to be The Thing’s gym and the inclusion of that “4” on the wall at the back is a nice little touch.
 

How great is this? As we mentioned, the Baxter Building that we got looked pretty boring but this is more like it and a genius way to incorporate the team’s logo into that. 
 

We caught a glimpse of Galactus within that cloud, but Fox did at least consider giving the iconic villain his human form, and we see him looming over Earth in this great piece of artwork. 
 

As the Silver Surfer and Human Torch race into action, Galactus powers up with the intention of making Earth his next victim. Even just a glimpse of the villain in this form would have been much appreciated by fans. 
 

Kevin Feige offered Fox the chance to keep Daredevil in exchange for Galactus and the Silver Surfer years ago, so he’s clearly had big plans for the characters in the MCU for a very long time. 
 

Dormammu was largely wasted by Marvel Studios in Doctor Strange (he was fine, but deserved a bigger role), so here’s hoping Galactus eventually becomes the MCU’s new big bad.
 

Even if this had been all we’d seen of Galactus in Rise of the Silver Surfer, it would have been so much better than what ended up on screen as that cloud was one of the worst things Fox ever did! 
 

This would have been epic to see. Alas, it was just created for reference by the artist and not one of the pieces Fox considered during the pre-production stages on Rise of the Silver Surfer.
 

We’re not sure what’s supposed to be happening here but it looks like this could be some sort of massive machine or energy source that Galactus was going to use to destroy the Earth. 
 

These are some pretty crazy visuals and another strange take on Galactus as Story clearly wanted him to be portrayed as an energy force of some kind rather than a huge man in a suit. 
 

While this does work in some respects, it isn’t Galactus and certainly not the version from the comic books fans wanted to see. If nothing else, Earth being drained like that does look quite cool. 
 

Doctor Doom riding the Silver Surfer’s surfboard was a weird decision, but one that worked surprisingly well in this sequel and certainly something you can imagine his comic book counterpart doing. 
 

“Before the script was done, we explored several types of rescue operations that could show the team in action,” he continues. “Most didn’t get past the ‘wouldn’t it be cool if…’ stage.  I particularly love the underwater rescue with Ben Grimm in THING-sized scuba gear.”

This really is a, well, fantastic visual and exactly what you’d hope to see from a movie like this. However, you have to believe that the technology of the time would have made making a sequence like this damn near impossible. 
 

Just seeing these heroes being heroes is great and these smaller scale saves is something the reboot definitely needs to focus on as Marvel’s First Family doesn’t just save the universe…they save regular people as well. 
 

“To help sell 20th Century Fox on this huge set piece, I thought it would be cool to do them as a hybrid comic book splash page/concept illustration style,” he continues. “Ultimately, this sequence proved a bit ambitious for the budget and was cut down quite a bit in the final film.” 
 

It seems budgetary issues plagued Rise of the Silver Surfer from the start and that’s a real shame because a moment like this would have been phenomenal to see on the big screen. 
 

“The image of the Surfer carrying Torch in the low oxygen stratosphere was directly inspired by an amazing Silver Surfer illustration done by the legendary Adi Grandov,” Deringer concludes, referencing the legendary Iron Man concept artist.
 

That’s more than likely Kravitz’s stunt double beneath the helmet, and while it’s not the most exciting costume, it definitely looks like something Catwoman could wear. 

After all, Batman’s Batsuit is very much grounded in reality based on what we’ve seen so far, and that belt is something the anti-hero has donned on a number of occasions in the comic books as part of her outfit. This probably isn’t the stylised suit most fans were hoping for, but the addition of a mask could more than make up for that. 

We’ll have to wait and see, but shooting appears to have taken a break today, so there haven’t been any additional shots of the Dark Knight taking ot the mean streets of Edinburgh. 

What are your thoughts on this possible first look at Catwoman in The Batman?

10. “Tower Of Babel”

Mark Waid’s critically acclaimed “Tower Of Babel” revealed that Batman has a way of taking down each and every member of the Justice League should they ever go bad (a plot point recently revisited by Geoff Johns in Justice League), something none of them are particularly happy to discover, especially when Ra’s al Ghul gets his hands on those weapons.

9. The Dark Knight Returns

Perhaps their most famous comic book battle to date, Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns is also the story which Zack Snyder heavily borrowed from for inspiration with Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

8. Batman/Superman Annual #1

This one-shot story isn’t anything particularly special, but the fight which takes place between Batman and Superman is still pretty interesting.

7. “The Trust”

6. Red Son

5. Batman: The Animated Series

Warner Bros. has yet to replicate the success of animated shows like Batman: The Animated Series and Superman: The Animated Series. As the shows aired at the same time, the two heroes met in crossover episodes a number of times, and there were two occasions where Batman completely humiliated the Man of Steel without needing to even lay a finger on him.

4. “Handful Of Dust”

As with many hero on hero battles, Batman and Superman most frequently seem to fight when one of them is under some sort of mind control. That was the case in Batman: The Dark Knight #5 near the start of The New 52 relaunch, but that made the David Finch illustrated battle no less epic to watch unfold.

3. “Hush”

During Jeph Loeb and Jim Lee’s popular “Hush” storyline, Superman ends up getting a kiss from Poison Ivy, and targets Batman while under her control.

2. The Dark Knight Strikes Again

There’s no two ways about it; The Dark Knight Strikes Again is terrible. The fact that it follows on from the critically acclaimed The Dark Knight Returns is hard to believe, as Frank Miller’s artwork and writing take a nosedive in quality.

1. Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice

This movie may have been somewhat controversial, but there’s no denying that it’s perhaps the perfect example of Batman finding a way to best Superman when they come to blows. 

After laying out a series of traps, this perfectly planned battle between the two heroes saw Bruce Wayne utilise Kryptonite in order to weaken his opponent and he wasn’t taking any prisoners; instead, the older Caped Crusader set out to MURDER Clark Kent and he very nearly succeeded. In fact, had a certain name not been said, he would have stabbed Superman to death!

So, as we said, controversial! 

Taking that ending aside, though, this was like watching the comic books come to life and Zack Snyder deserves a lot of credit for how this fight was handled…Superman fans may not agree!

Batfleck Backlash

On August 22nd, 2013, Ben Affleck was announced as the new Batman for what was then being billed as an untitled Man of Steel sequel. Despite his impressive turns in movies like The Town and Argo, there was an immediate backlash and fans really weren’t on board with him playing the Caped Crusader.

Here on CBM, the article revealing the news received over 1500 comments with gems like, “[I’m] just really not a fan of this news… [I] feel like DC hates us,” “Nothing about Affleck screams Bruce Wayne or Batman,” and “NO. No way, this has got to be a joke surely? I mean, BEN AFFLECK? BEN AFFLECK!?!?!?!? No way. I refuse to believe it.” And those are just the clean ones! 

This wasn’t a good start for Batfleck and the actor later talked about being told by Warner Bros. to not pay too much attention to what was being said online. Unfortunately, things would only get worse for him from there…

Batman v Superman Bombs

As time passed, the images and trailers made it clear that Affleck was a great choice to play the hero (visually, at least) and when Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice hit theaters, pretty much no one had anything bad to say about his version of the character.

Unfortunately, the movie took an absolute pounding and the actor became a meme thanks to an interview which saw him dubbed “Sad Affleck.” He clearly wasn’t happy with the way things were going, but remained attached to direct a Batman movie he’d been writing with comic book scribe Geoff Johns and was lined up to appear in Suicide Squad. 

Still, he can’t have been pleased about starring in a critical flop as it hurt his status as a director and was like Daredevil all over again.
 

A Pointless Suicide Squad Cameo

When set photos showed Batman chasing down The Joker and Harley Quinn, fans were extremely excited to see how that would play out in Suicide Squad. Unfortunately, his appearance there boiled down to an underwhelming car chase in which he never interacted with the Clown Prince of Crime and a far too brief battle with Deadshot which was a total disappointment. 

On the plus side, we did get a pretty cool mid-credits scene featuring Bruce Wayne and Amanda Waller.

The main problem was that Suicide Squad was another critical flop for Warner Bros. and while Batman’s role was brief, this was another bad superhero movie (according to the critics, at least) that Affleck’s name was attached to. It was at this point that he clearly started to grow frustrated with the role. 
 

Ben Affleck’s Frustrations

“With Live by Night, it took me a year and a half to write and get ready, and I worked really hard and — it’s just, nobody gave a sh*t!,” Affleck told Jimmy Kimmel when asked for an update on The Batman. “But with Batman, I keep on getting, ‘Where’s the f***ing Batman script?!’ I’m like, ‘Whoa — I’m working! Give me a second!'”

It seemed like the pressure was getting the best of him. Live by Night (which Affleck directed while shooting Batman v Superman and Justice League, thereby taking his attention away from that movie) was a critical disappointment and that really can’t have helped. 

It was around this time that rumours about him being done with Batman after Justice League started gaining traction and it seemed as if his days as the hero might be numbered. However, fans held out hope because The Batman was still in the works. Well, not for much longer, unfortunately! 
 

The Batman Falls Apart

Affleck’s version of The Batman would have pitted the Dark Knight against Joe Manganiello’s Deathstroke and that was an idea fans could get on board with (especially with Johns contributing his comic book knowledge to the script). 

On January 30th, 2017, the actor issued the following statement about no longer directing the movie:

“There are certain characters who hold a special place in the hearts of millions. Performing this role demands focus, passion and the very best performance I can give. It has become clear that I cannot do both jobs to the level they require. Together with the studio, I have decided to find a partner in a director who will collaborate with me on this massive film. I am still in this, and we are making it, but we are currently looking for a director. I remain extremely committed to this project, and look forward to bringing this to life for fans around the world.”

That was it for his version of The Batman but things still looked good because at least Affleck was going to team up with a new director to bring the movie to life, while still playing the Caped Crusader. Hell, he even declared at Comic-Con that, “I am the luckiest guy in the world, Batman is the coolest f***ing part in any universe.” Matt Reeves was hired but things didn’t go as we thought. 
 

Creative Differences?

Reeves quickly made it clear that he was not only making changes to Affleck and John’s script; he was totally rewriting it from scratch. What was going to be an action movie along the lines of The Raid was to be transformed into a noir thriller and the director clearly had a different vision for how Batman’s story should play out, hence why we started hearing rumblings about it being a prequel.

Whether or not Affleck’s departure had something to do with creative differences behind the scenes is hard to say, but it really didn’t feel like these two were ever on the same page and that when Warner Bros. hired Reeves, they knew he wanted to essentially reboot the character and take him down a more standalone path which isn’t necessarily connected to the wider DC Extended Universe.
 

The Justice League Dilemma

We really don’t need to recap what went wrong with Justice League again but the fact is, this was the third DC movie that Affleck starred in which was met with scathing reviews from critics. 

He can’t have been happy with that and the writing was on the wall at this point.

Sure, we were hearing stories that he might play Batman one final time in Flashpoint to bring a close to his time as the character while a younger actor would take over in The Batman, but once that fell apart and Warner Bros. decided to focus on standalone story, it was apparent that it was simply a matter of time before it was made official that he would no longer be playing Bruce Wayne.
 

A New Batman

It feels like we spent all of 2018 sifting through rumours about who could be the next Batman and names like Jack O’Connell, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Richard Armitage continued popping up online. 

Nothing concrete was revealed, of course, and as far as we were concerned, Affleck was technically still attached to the role. His personal life was in disarray, though, as he re-entered rehab and clearly had more on his plate than playing a superhero again.

The trades and fansites weighed in but nothing was made official until earlier this year. 
 

Batman, No More

This year, The Batman got a release date: June 25th, 2021. It won’t star Ben Affleck, though, and Robert Pattinson was cast by Matt Reeves. The movie will reportedly be a noir-type detective story that finally sheds some light on why the Dark Knight has been described as the World’s Greatest Detective. 

We don’t know if this will be a reboot, a prequel, or a standalone adventure unrelated to Justice League. However, after months of conflicting reports and rumours, Affleck is obviously done as Batman and that’s a shame because it’s hard to escape the feeling that we missed something special here. 

Had things played out differently, we could have very easily seen his Batman on screen for years to come but it wasn’t meant to be.
 

Based on this toy, it’s hard to say whether Kristen Wiig will look awesome or awful as the fan-favourite comic book baddie. However, like the recently revealed promo art, it’s bound to get fans talking.

In related news, a new image from Wonder Woman 1984 has also been unveiled, and it puts the spotlight on Diana Prince in her Golden Eagle armour. Seeing Gal Gadot take flight in that promises to be one of the best parts of the entire movie, and common sense says that we’ll see her use that to take on Cheetah in what will hopefully be an epic battle. 

There’s currently no word on when the next trailer for the Wonder Woman sequel will hit, but following that recent Entertainment Weekly cover story, it could be with us sooner rather than later.

What do you guys think of these new looks at Wonder Woman and Cheetah? 

The movie begins with Diana Prince working in the Natural History Museum in Washington, D.C., but she lives a quiet, lonely life. “She has not only had the loss of [Chris Pine’s] Steve Trevor,” explains producer Charles Roven, “[but] she’s lost nearly all the people that are important to her because they’re not immortal, and her life is actually quite lonely and spartan. In fact, the only joy that she gets out of it is when she’s actually doing something for people, if she can help those in need.”

Wonder Woman will square off with Cheetah in the movie, but Kristen Wiig wasn’t exactly a comic book expert when she was cast to play Dr. Barbara Minerva in the sequel to the 2017 release. 

“I did not really know so much about Cheetah,” the actress admits. “Before I even talked to Patty [Jenkins], there was an idea that maybe it might be about being a villain for the movie, so I went online and looked at all the villains of Wonder Woman to try to figure out which one, because I was so excited, And I was really, really happy to find out it was her.”

“I’ve never really played someone who walks into the room and owns it — especially when she starts out so insecure and self-deprecating,” Wiig adds. “We didn’t want to see Barbara in Cheetah, and I didn’t want to see Kristen in Cheetah, either.”
 

Wonder Woman 1984 features the return of Chris Pine as Steve Trevor, but no one was willing to reveal how exactly the character returns in the 1980s after dying during World War I. 

“In the first movie, I played the world-weary soldier who has seen all the depravity that humankind is capable of displaying,” the actor says. “And in this one I get to be much more wide-eyed and joyful. My role is really just as a friend, lover, boyfriend-cum-bodyguard who’s trying his best to help Diana on her mission. I’m like the Watson to her Holmes.”
 

What do you guys think of this new look at Wonder Woman 1984? Are you excited to see the Amazon Warrior in action? As always, let us know your thoughts in the comments section!

Doctor Strange comes face to face with the Mad Titan here, but it’s clear that the Sorcerer Supreme’s power is no match for him.

This was a battle we saw plenty of in Avengers: Infinity War, and it didn’t end well for Strange there either, but the setting here looks quite a bit more foreboding as Thanos stands tall. 
 

Once feared by the world, The Hulk had become a hero by time we met his “Smart” form in Avengers: Endgame. That’s something which is evident from this shot of a kid clearly happy to meet the Jade Giant. 

This would have been a sweet moment, but the selfie sequence had a similar impact! 
 

The present-day version of Nebular spies on Thanos and his Black Order, and it definitely would have been no bad thing to see the unofficial Avengers be a little more pro-active here.

As it stands, some mechanical issues meant she quite easily fell into Thanos’ hands. 
 

Avengers: Infinity War didn’t have a lot of time to spend on the romance between The Vision and Wanda, but it was clear that they were in love. 

That just made it all the more tragic when Thanos tore the Infinity Stone from the hero’s head. 
 

Doctor Strange has been defeated, and this looks a lot like what we saw in the movie itself. 

However, it seems like the Sorcerer Supreme may have taken a real beating from Thanos, and it’s hard not to wonder whether Marvel Studios considering killing him during this battle. 
 

In the comic books, Nebula uses the Infinity Stones to restore her good looks and defeat her father.

Clearly, that something the Russo Brothers considered for Avengers: Endgame, but it looks like the strain of that is quite literally tearing the anti-hero apart here. 
 

Bringing “Smart Hulk” to the big screen was a ballsy move on Marvel Studios’ part.

After all, the character may have completely bombed on screen, but the Russos nailed it. Here, we see this intelligent version of the Green Goliath sitting down and pondering his future. 
 

Thanos threw Gamora to her death in Avengers: Infinity War, but it seems like that was originally going to happen at some sort of pit rather than the cliff we saw on Vormir.

It certainly makes for an interesting visual, and would have no doubt been every bit as tragic. 
 

What a way to go for poor old Nick Fury! 

The one-time S.H.I.E.L.D. Director was absent from both these movies until the very end of Avengers: Endgame, but it seems Marvel Studios once considered having the forgettable Corvus Glaive end him once and for all. 
 

Spider-Man heading into outer space with Iron Man was definitely unexpected, but Tony Stark actually saving Peter Parker and taking him along for the ride is obviously a lot different to what happened in the movie itself.

Interestingly, there’s also no sign of the Iron Spider costume here as Spidey seems to be in read and black instead. 
 

Either Nick Fury was supposed to be part of the Secret Avengers team or he would have tracked them down in Scotland, but this appears to be the fateful moment he would have sacrificed himse to save Steve Rogers. 

That would have been quite the way for him to go, but he now lives on in the MCU and is chilling in outer space. 
 

A very different take on Steve Rogers in his Secret Avengers gear, it seems like Sam Wilson and The Falcon were going to join him during this particular mission. 

As cool as this would have been, keeping the team in battered versions of their superhero costumes arguably worked a little better.
 

This is an awesome shot of Tony Stark “suiting up,” and it definitely looks like the Armoured Avenger is ready for battle.

Marvel Studios’ decision to move to this nanotech armour wasn’t appreciated by fans who like his actual suits, but it’s something that ended up working really well in these movies. 
 

Earth’s Mightiest Heroes confront Thanos following the events of Avengers: Infinity War, and it seems like the Infinity Gauntlet is still in one piece, and that he’s kept the Stones.

This would have changed what happened a lot, so is likely just from a very early stage in development. 
 

A victorious Ebony Maw reports his victory to Thanos as Doctor Strange lies prone in the background. 

We really didn’t see anywhere near enough of the Black Order interacting with their “father,” and that only helped make the villainous crew all the more forgettable. 
 

A defeated Loki watches on as Thanos takes the Space Stone for himself, but this looks an awful lot different to how Avengers: Infinity War actually opened.

Perhaps the God of Mischief was going to originally help the Mad Titan in his quest? 
 

We’re not entirely sure what’s supposed to be happening here, but it looks like The Vision is actually fighting the Scarlet Witch! 

He has his hand around her throat and she’s crying, so perhaps the android was going to fall under Thanos’ control due to the Mad Titan wielding the Infinity Stones? 
 

What are your thoughts on this awesome new concept art from Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame? As always, be sure to let us know in the comments section down below.