#so many spoilers
“It’s okay, part of the journey is the end”
The Black Widow movie highlights all the problems I had with the way Joss Whedon approached the forced hysterectomy aspect of Nat’s background.
As Yelena notes when she shows Nat her vest- the girls of the Red Room don’t have bodily autonomy. They can’t make any decisions for themselves. The hysterectomy bit in the plane acts as a very vile and vivid example of this.
Joss Whedon chose to put all his focus on the “no kids” angle instead of the bodily autonomy angle. In his eyes the horror was the absence of child bearing, not the absence of choice. To him- it’s a given that all the girls in Red Room would’ve had babies if their lives had gone differently- bc women who can’t have children are monsters and societal outcasts.
When Nat inquired about Yelena wanting kids she replied that she wanted a dog. I take this as Yelena doesn’t want kids, BUT she still mourns the loss of that choice. She resents how she never had a chance to come to that realization herself. Which, for most women, will hit home more than just “shes infertile and it’s the worst possible thing that could happen to her.”
