Avengers: Endgame writers explain why Hulk and Black Widow romance wasn't addressed

Fans were expecting some kind of resolution to the on-off romance between two major characters

The writers behind Avengers: Endgame have explained why they chose to ignore the romantic relationship between The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo) and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson).

The two characters had been romantically involved until the events of Age of Ultron, with one scene featured in Infinity War. Yet there was no reference to the relationship in the final instalment of the hit Marvel franchise.

Speaking to Empire’s film podcast, writers Stephen McFeely and Christopher Markus said there had been attempts to address it but ultimately filmrunners felt it would be “more elegant” to avoid it altogether.

“In Infinity War we have scenes… wrote ’em, shot ’em… of them sort of hashing that out,” McFeely said. “’You’ve been gone, I’ve moved on’ – that kind of stuff. It became very clear that if a scene was not on the ‘A plot’, it could not survive Infinity War.”

“That thing has to be on rails just to get to the finish line. You couldn’t wrap up loose threads just because you wanted to,” he said.

Markus added that the pair had been of the opinion that trying to develop the relationship between the two characters in Endgame would seem “odd”, given that the rest of the squad were trying to save the world.

“It [would] seem a little odd, in the midst of everyone’s mourning and [Hulk’s] change to a 2,000-pound genius, to go, ‘And they’re dating!’”