Marvel secretly confirms when Black Widow’s Budapest mission happened

A deleted scene from Black Widow subtly reveals when Natasha Romanoff’s mission to Budapest was supposed to have taken place in the MCU timeline.

Marvel has secretly confirmed when Black WidowThe Budapest mission has taken place. Marvel has long teased that some sort of key event in Black Widow’s life took place in Budapest, with Natasha frequently exchanging jokes about it with Hawkeye. It all resulted in Avengers: Endgame, with Hawkeye joking that the two’s journey to the planet Vormir was taking them “far from Budapest.“

At last, Black Widow revealed what happened in Budapest. It appears that Black Widow traveled to Budapest on a mission to the Red Room, where she crossed paths with Hawkeye, who had been tasked by SHIELD to take her down. He made a different call, instead of partnering with her on an assassination mission targeting General Dreykov, the man who ran the Red Room. Funny enough, as is often the case with MCU flashbacks like this, Black WidowThe Budapest mission doesn’t quite match previous teasers – but it pretty much works.

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But when did Black Widow’s mission to Budapest take place? The movie itself was silent on this, but a deleted scene reveals when Marvel had planned it. The “Bike Chase” scene is an expanded version of Natasha and Yelena’s robbery of Taskmaster, only for Natasha to ride the motorcycle they are riding in what Yelena describes as a “cage.“A frustrated Natasha complains that the building was not there eight years ago – thus confirming how much time has passed since her last visit to Budapest, and therefore since she betrayed the Red Room and joined SHIELD. Black Widow takes place in 2016, shortly after Captain America: Civil War, which means that the initial Budapest mission must have taken place in 2008.

This reveal allows viewers to make sense of the Black Widow timeline. As confirmed in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Natasha was born on December 3, 1984. In 1995, the child was part of a Russian spy cell that infiltrated the United States in order to steal mind control chemicals cultivated by SHIELD (which ironically means the Red Room was working against Hydra, given it was actually a Hydra plan). She was taken to the Red Room at the end of this mission and worked for General Dreykov for over a decade – until 2008 when she switched sides and joined SHIELD. Nick Fury was already working on the Avengers initiative in 2008, so it’s likely he designated the super-spy as a member of the project early on.

2008 was truly the year the MCU was born. In 2008, Tony Stark rose to prominence as Iron Man to the world, while according to the Black Panther Prelude miniseries, T’Challa succeeded his father as Black Panther in Wakanda. Now according to Black Widowscenes deleted from, Marvel seems to have predicted 2008 to be the year Natasha Romanoff also joined SHIELD. It’s rather a shame that “Bike Chase” was cut, as it fits the narrative well and adds a bit of depth to the MCU; but at least Marvel’s intention is clear.

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