Marvel Cinematic Universe star Mark Ruffalo has revealed details about Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige and his fight for a female-led superhero movie. The journey to the first female-starring film has been a long one for the MCU. In fact, despite whatever good intentions they may have had, the DCEU beat them to it with 2017’s Wonder Woman. Marvel then released Ant-Man and the Wasp in 2018, which became the studio’s first film with a female character’s name in the title. However, at that point, no woman from the MCU had led a movie on her own.

This changed when Marvel released Captain Marvel with Brie Larson last year, a movie many saw as a long time coming. Luckily, the MCU doesn’t plan on slowing down its push for female-led movies. The long-awaited Black Widow movie, which many assumed would happen before Captain Marvel, will finally release this May. It will feature the return of Scarlett Johansson as Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow and explore her time between Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War. It will also introduce audiences to two new Black Widows in Rachel Weisz and Florence Pugh.

In an interview with The Independent, Ruffalo relayed what Feige told him about his fight for a female-led MCU movie, explaining, “When we did the first Avengers, Kevin Feige told me, ‘Listen, I might not be here tomorrow. Ike [Isaac Perlmutter, Disney’s largest shareholder at the time] does not believe that anyone will go to a female-starring superhero movie. So if I am still here tomorrow, you will know that I won that battle.’" Ruffalo also gave credit to Feige for pushing the issue, saying “He changed the whole Marvel universe. We now have a gay superhero on the way, we have black superheroes, we have female superheroes…No other studio is being that inclusive on that level.”

As Ruffalo said, Marvel is certainly trying hard to increase inclusion in both its movies and upcoming TV shows for Disney+. Both of the upcoming films The Eternals and Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings will feature diverse casts. In fact, Shang-Chi will have an almost entirely Asian cast. On the TV side, several of the Disney+ MCU shows will be led by women, most of whom will also appear in future movies. A She-Hulk series is in the works, as is Ms. Marvel. Elizabeth Olsen will also co-headline WandaVision later this year as her character, Scarlet Witch.

Though many fans felt it took too long for Marvel to finally release a MCU female-led movie, it’s reassuring to hear how passionate Feige was about the idea early on. Also, it’s clear that the studio is making efforts to right any past wrongs when it comes to inclusion. It will unfortunately be a long time before movies accurately represent the world, but at least one of the biggest studios out there is trying to play its part. Hopefully, fans will see even more MCU female-led movies in the years to come.

More: Every Female Superhero Movie Has Been A Spinoff - Except For One

Source: The Independent

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