Natasha Romanoff must face her past to reveal the future in the latest trailer for Marvel Studios' Black Widow. Once again showing off the explosive action to come in the highly anticipated, long delayed installment in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Black Widow sees Scarlett Johansson reprise the title role for what is likely the final time.

The newest footage gives us a further glimpse into Natasha's past, as she protects a young girl revealed to be Florence Pugh's Yelena Belova. A sister-figure to Romanoff who was also trained in the Red Room as a Black Widow, it is now expected that Yelena will become an MCU mainstay, taking over from Natasha and becoming the new Black Widow.

"[Kevin Feige] realised that the audience would expect an origin story so, of course, we went in the opposite direction," director Cate Shortland said last year. "And we didn't know how great Florence Pugh would be. We knew she would be great, but we didn't know how great. Scarlett is so gracious, like, 'Oh, I'm handing her the baton.' So it's going to propel another female storyline."

Johansson meanwhile has come to terms with Black Widow being her swansong, with the actress recently saying goodbye to her time in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. "Honestly, I feel like it's always, it feels great to leave a party when it's still raging and I think that this film [Black Widow] feels very much like it's alive and fresh and powerful and I feel really pleased with it," she said. "I feel really happy with the work that we've done for this decade of time and, you know, it's bitter sweet to say, 'Goodbye,' but if you love something, you need to set it free!"

Johansson joins the likes of Robert Downey Jr.'s Iron Man and Chris Evans' Captain America in leaving the franchise after a decade, with these founding members of the Marvel superhero team The Avengers having made huge sacrifices in defending the Earth. Sadly, only the Star-Spangled Man received a happy ending, with both Tony Stark and Natasha Romanoff meeting their demise in 2019's Avengers: Endgame.

Black Widow finds Natasha Romanoff forced to confront the darker parts of her famous 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. Black Widow will provide some insight into the origins of one of the founding Avengers, even revealing details regarding the famous mission in Budapest. Along with wrapping up Romanoff's story, Black Widow will introduce a host of new characters including Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova, David Harbour as Alexei Shostakov AKA Red Guardian, and Rachel Weisz as Melina Vostokoff.

Black Widow will be the first movie in Phase Four of the MCU and was delayed three times from an original May 2020 release date due to the ongoing global situation. Black Widow is scheduled to be released in the United States on July 9, 2021, simultaneously in theaters and through Disney+ with Premier Access.