Ka-Pow 101: Avengers Assemble

Finally, here comes another lesson in Ka-Pow 101. Syncing up with today’s release, we’ll take a look at the Avengers. To be specific, we’ll look at some of the characters who haven’t featured in their own movies.

Black Widow played by Scarlett Johansson

Black Widow is Natasha Romanoff, an agent of SHIELD. We got to see her in action in Iron Man 2 as the SHIELD spy keeping an eye on Tony Stark. But where did she come from? Natalia Romanova (wait, what? yeah… Americanized names! Go!) was trained from her youth to be a master assassin in the Soviet “Red Room” program which trained young girls. She was granted bio- and psycho-tech enhancements (whatever that means), and planted with memories of an alternate youth. She eventually defected from Russia, and became a member of SHIELD.

Hawkeye played by Jeremy Renner

Hawkeye is Clint Barton, yet another agent of SHIELD. We briefly glimpsed him in Thor watching over Thor’s assault on the compound studying his hammer. Trained in the circus to be a master marksman, Barton was not originally recognized as a hero. During his first outing as Hawkeye, he is accused of theft and goes on the run from the Avengers. Wait a minute. It looks like things have changed for the movie. The question is, “When do we get to find out more?”

Maria Hill played by Cobie Smulders

Maria Hill is Maria Hill… oh, never mind. You get it. SHIELD agent. Anyway, she is the most recent addition to the Marvel Universe of these three. Hill appeared in comics in 2005 as a replacement to Nick Fury who had gone rogue. As the Executive Director, she was in control of SHIELD during the reformation of the Avengers following the massive prison break of super-villain prison, the Raft. In the comics, she initially worked against the Avengers, but it appears she’s going to be backing them whole-heartedly in the film.

What other changes are made in the film? We’ll find out this weekend in The Avengers as well as future films.