The Best Black Widow Storylines To Get To Know Natasha Romanoff
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137 VOTESStory Found In: Black Widow #1-6
To say Natasha has a dark past is the understatement of all comicdom, but when that past comes back to haunt her, she finds herself on the run from the entire organization of SHIELD as well as Iron Man!
She finds herself completely on her own, running from pretty much everyone she ever called friend or foe, which takes her back to the place it all began: the Black Widow Red Room. Here, she must uncover her past so that she can preserve her future or she'll find herself running for the rest of her life.
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219 VOTESStory Found In: Black Widow (1999) #1-3
Black Widow makes her Marvel Knights appearance in a debut mini-series featuring the new Black Widow, Yelena Belova. What happens when the new Black Widow and the old one come face-to-face? Well, they battle it out, of course!
Natasha works to teach her successor the same lessons she herself learned, which took her from being the top assassin of the Soviet Union and made her into an Avenger. Of course, it's not as easy as it sounds thanks to the same sort of mental and physical conditioning Natasha went through in her youth, which stands in the way of bringing Yelena around to her way of thinking.
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323 VOTESStory Found In: Black Widow (2004) #1-6
Black Widow is one of those characters who is a lot less like James Bond and a lot more like Jason Bourne. This story plays out much like a Jason Bourne adventure in that it's gritty, hard boiled, and incredibly exciting.
After a brief attempt at retirement, an attempt on Natasha's life forces her to return to the one place she most desperately wants to avoid: Russia. There's a reason she prefers to avoid her old stomping grounds, and it all plays out in a brutal fashion that makes for a great story full of intense action and the over-the-top violence you might expect from a Black Widow story.
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416 VOTESStory Found In: Marvel Fanfare #10-13
After Black Widow's friend Ivan is kidnapped and brainwashed, it's up to Natasha to save him. She ends up making the trek back to the U.S.S.R. where she is set upon by six master assassins. The plan was to replace her with a double who would assassinate Nick Fury, but it takes more than six master assassins to take down the Black Widow!
This leads her to take up the task of thwarting the overall plot and save Fury. In this story, which played out in the pages of Marvel Fanfare, the reader is treated with some of the most beautiful pencils by famed writer/artist George Perez alongside a co-authored piece by Ralph Macchio. This is one of the best stories to feature the character, and is often considered one of her best, and most intriguing adventures!
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519 VOTESStory Found In: Black Widow (1999) #1-3, Black Widow (2001) #1-3, and Black Widow: Pale Little Spider #1-3
Back in the 1990s, Marvel decided it would be a good idea to thwart the Comics Code of Authority by publishing books that didn't even seek its approval. This is how the Marvel Knights imprint came to life, and it worked as a place that could feature Marvel's more violent and gritty characters without being concerned with all the provisions placed on the rest of the company's books.
Of course, Black Widow was chosen as one of those characters whose story and appeal veered more towards an adult audience. Natasha's adventures have been collected into a single trade paperback, which features some of the stories also covered on this list alongside several more. Her backstory comes into full focus with more definition and detail than ever before in this gritty compendium of espionage and assassination!
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632 VOTESStory Found In: Black Widow #1-6 and All-New Marvel Now! Point One
Early in the game, Black Widow left her life as an assassin behind to join forces with the Avengers, but every now and again, her past comes back to stir things up. In "The Finely Woven Thread," Natasha leaves the Avengers to take on a secret mission of her own, and it puts her up against a new and powerful enemy.
This is easily one of the best stories to feature the character, and it was published as recently as 2014. Featuring the beautiful and captivating artwork of Phil Noto with writer Nathan Edmondson, this is one of those Black Widow stories that no fan should go without reading.
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Story Found In: Bizarre Adventures #25
In this beautifully illustrated black and white adventure, an agent of MI-6 is killed by an unknown squad of assailants, and it's up to Natasha to find out what happened. She is ordered to infiltrate and take out an arms installation somewhere in Africa.
She eventually finds herself facing off with her nemesis, Irma Klausvichnova, but it turns out to actually be a SHIELD imposter named Stacy Cromwell who was killed by the American Agent she was told she could trust! This is one of those espionage stories that works really well for the character, and while it does have some silly puns, it stands as one of the greats where the Black Widow is concerned.
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821 VOTESStory Found In: The Amazing Spider-Man #86
Black Widow was around for a while before she made her way to the iconic look we all know and love her for today. That look didn't hit shelves until the publication of The Amazing Spider-Man #86 in 1970. She was featured in the story, "Beware the Black Widow!"
In the story, she was introduced in her new look, which features the skintight black costume, wristbands, which fired spider-like threads, and shoulder-length red hair. Natasha's skills were also on full display in this book, which pitted her up against everybody's Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man himself!
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933 VOTESStory Found In: Black Widow (2010) #1-5
After nearly being killed by a mysterious villain, Natasha is framed as a traitor to the rest of her superhero buddies. This puts Natasha on the run for the billionth time, but that's where she works best. Every trick and bit of training comes in handy as she employs all of her espionage skills to evade capture and prove herself innocent.
At the same time, several of her friends work to also prove her innocence as they have become all too familiar with the "frame Natasha for a crime she didn't commit" gambit. Lady Bullseye also makes an appearance as a new adversary for Natasha, and it all unfolds rather nicely in this adventurous tale of deceit and deception!
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1017 VOTESStory Found In: Tales of Suspense #52
Every superhero has a first appearance, and for Natasha, it was all the way back in 1964's Tales of Suspense #52. The story, titled "The Crimson Dynamo Strikes Again" depicts the Black Widow as the principal antagonist to Iron Man, but it wouldn't be long before she makes the move towards superheroism.
This was a classic Iron Man tale as well, which featured the amazing words of Paul Reinman alongside beautiful artwork by Jack "The King" Kirby.
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119 VOTESStory Found In: Black Widow #1-3
"Breakdown" is a sequel to the first 1999 Marvel Knights miniseries starring Black Widow. In these books, Natasha and the new Black Widow, Yelena Belova, switch bodies in a sort of Parent Trap meets Russian spy/assassins sort of tale.
While that description hardly does "Breakdown" any justice, this story unfolds in a humurous, yet serious manner. Both women must adjust to the life of the other, but while Natasha knows what's going on, Yelena must contend with the body swap without any idea of what's happening to her.
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1211 VOTESStory Found In: Black Widow #7
Natasha is well known for her skills in the art of assassination, which is why it's not a huge stretch of the imagination that she was involved in the murder of a United States Senator. Of course, she was framed, but that doesn't mean she doesn't have to contend with the CIA and a trove of superhuman assassins who are hot on her trail.
Not only that, she also needs to deal with the deceased Senator's son, who will tire at nothing to prove the Black Widow killed his father. The whole story takes place in this single issue, but that doesn't detract from the intensity and excitement of this self-contained issue.
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1310 VOTESStory Found In: Amazing Adventures #5
In this classic Christmas tale, Natasha's friend, Ivan saves a young teenager from killing himself but reaches out to Black Widow for help. The teen explained to her that he and his friends had a sort of falling out when they decided it would be fun to enjoy a life of crime and villainy.
He planned to kill himself... take himself out of the equation before they could, but his plan was thwarted, and now it's up to Natasha to keep him safe! Will she be able to keep the young man alive in this Christmas caper or will things fall apart like so many plans during the holidays end up doing?
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1410 VOTESStory Found In: The Avengers #43-44
In this two-part story, Black Widow's work on a secret mission for SHIELD (from The Avengers #38) comes into focus when she has to publicly turn on both the Avengers and the United States of America. She does this to uncover a Russian/Chinese project called the Psychotron.
With her mission to destroy the machine, she separates herself from everything she knows and gets to work. This story also features her husband (previously believed to be deceased) and the rest of the team as mind control, evil people, and the development of technology she truly fears comes to a head!
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1511 VOTESStory Found In: Journey into Mystery #517–519
With her debut in Journey into Mystery, Black Widow finds herself in a story titled, "The Fire Next Time," which plays out across a three-issue arc written by Scott Lobdell with pencils by Randy Green.
In the story, she finds herself standing up against a new terrorist organization called "Freedom's Light," but will she prevail against such a huge threat, or will she need to call in the big guns to help her out? She may have to go undercover to infiltrate the crazed organization so she could take it out from within in this amazing story of danger and espionage sure to entertain fans of the character!
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1614 VOTESStory Found In: Marvel 1602
Marvel 1602 is a reimagining of the Marvel Universe from acclaimed writer, Neil Gaiman. Superpowers arrived in the Marvel chronology sometime in the 1930s, which gave rise to the era of superheroes... but what would have happened had those events taken place centuries before?
In this reimagining of the Marvel Universe, superpowers and the characters associated with them arose during the first parts of the seventeenth century. Natasha is a freelance spy who is regarded as "the most dangerous woman in Europe."
In this story, she teamed up with Daredevil only to eventually betray him to Count Otto Von Doom, with whom she is engaged in a romantic relationship. The story highlights the parts of Black Widow's character that fascinates and captivates readers in a new and complex setting fans are sure to enjoy.
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1712 VOTESStory Found In: Secret Avengers #20
"Encircle" is an amazing one-shot book from Secret Avengers, which depicts Black Widow as the lone survivor for her group. Before War Machine passes on, he gives his teammate a device that lets her travel through time to a pre-set destination in the past.
This gives her the opportunity to... put right what once went wrong, so she travels back to different points in time so that she can affect just enough minor changes to the timeline without having everything paradoxically smash down around her.
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1810 VOTESStory Found In: Widowmaker #1-4
In "Widowmaker," Black Widow teams up with Hawkeye and his ex-wife, Mockingbird to investigate the murder of a SHIELD agent. As events play out, it becomes apparent that special agents around the world are turning up dead, and both Natasha and Mockingbird are both on the killer's list of intended targets!
The entire four-issue story is collected in a brilliant trade paperback consisting of amazing art by David Lopes, Manuel Garcia, and Al Milgrom with a beautiful cover by Jae Lee. The books were written by Jim McCann, Duane Swierczynski, and Tom Defalso.
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198 VOTESStory Found In: Marvel Graphic Novel #61
In this tale from Marvel Graphic Novel, Natasha finds herself being blackmailed into doing numerous tasks which do not fit in with her definition of morality. She ends up doing these things to save the life of her husband, whom she believed dead... twice!
In this tale of intrigue and backstabbing, Natasha truly defines who she is and how this woman, who is a product of the Cold War, must cope in a world after the fall of the Soviet Union.
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209 VOTESStory Found In: 1872 #1-4, Avengers (1963) #80, and Marvel Comics Presents (1988) #170
This story takes place in the Battleworld zone of 1872, which has a sheriff known as Steve Rogers facing off against corruption and fear in the town of Timely. In this story, Natasha Barnes is a widow who was married to the sheriff's deputy, Bucky Barnes.
Barnes was killed by the Mayor's (Wilson Fisk) men when he tried to stop a lynching. Natasha ends up teaming up with Red Wolf and Doctor Bruce Banner to take down the villainous Fisk and his army of henchmen while working to destroy a dam that separates the Cheyenne from their only source of fresh water in the area.
