Photo: Javier Albuja on Unsplash
Yelena Belova started as a supporting character in a movie about someone else, and she's now one of the people the MCU is building around. Here's how that happened.
Where she started
Florence Pugh first played Yelena in Black Widow, the 2021 film set between Civil War and Infinity War. Yelena is Natasha Romanoff's sister by way of an undercover Red Room operation, raised alongside her in a fake American family in Ohio before both were funneled into the Widow program.
Two things made the character stick immediately. She's funny, in a flat, deadpan way that cuts right through Marvel's usual banter. And she is openly unimpressed with the superhero business, including Natasha's poses.
The Hawkeye turn
Later that year she showed up in Hawkeye, hired to kill Clint Barton and convinced he was responsible for Natasha's death. The show turned her grief into the emotional spine of the last few episodes, and her scenes with Kate Bishop set up a partnership fans have wanted more of ever since.
Thunderbolts
Thunderbolts* in 2025 put her at the center of a team of Marvel's damaged people. It's the closest the MCU has come to making a movie about depression and still landing punchlines, and Pugh carries it.
What's next
Pugh is in the cast of Avengers: Doomsday, out December 18, 2026, alongside a roster that spans the Avengers, the Fantastic Four, the Thunderbolts, and X-Men actors from the Fox films. If you want the background on the villain, we wrote a Doctor Doom explainer.
In the comics
Comics Yelena has been around since 1999, created by Devin Grayson and J.G. Jones, and she has taken up the Black Widow name, worked for multiple sides, and spent a good stretch as a genuine antagonist. Her screen version is warmer and funnier than most of her comics history.
And yes, our Belova Potato Farm shirt is about her. If you get it, you get it.