Could A 'Red Guardian' Movie Happen? David Harbour And 'Black Widow' Director Cate Shortland Weigh In

Hot on the heels of Black Widow pulling in a great post-lockdown global weekend, we have some juicy speculation to indulge in, so buckle up. Said speculation comes directly from Black Widow director Cate Shortland and actor David Harbour, so it's a step above fan theory but it's still not real.

In an interview with The Wrap, the conversation turned towards a standalone Red Guardian movie, and it seems that both Harbour and Shortland are eager for the character's return.

Shortland in particular was vocal about how great the character was and how perfectly Harbour played him to the point that there was too much good stuff by the end of the shoot and a huge chunk of his work ended up on the cutting room floor. She very much encourages Marvel to make a Red Guardian movie that's a flat-out comedy. Harbour, naturally, doesn't disagree and talks a little more about the fun of squeezing into the Red Guardian's costume.

We did that a lot! There's a whole other movie too, on the cutting room floor, of like, me and Rachel flirting throughout the movie and various sequences. When she breaks me out of prison and, you know, her stuff with the Taskmaster. I mean, there's tons of stuff that we improv in this movie. And I think that's a credit to Cate Shortland, she saw the chemistry between us and she saw sort of our voracious, you know, appetite for these characters and for this world, and she just kind of let us run with it.

On the one hand, knowing the creatives involved are eager to return for more is a good sign for the Red Guardian to pop up again down the line. On the other hand, the fact that they're openly talking about it most likely means that ain't in the cards, at least not yet.

Harbour destroys in the role. The man's quickly proven himself to be a national treasure. We know that Marvel pays attention to how the fans react to certain smaller characters, so there may be a world in which we get more of Alexsie Shostakov and, hopefully, that would also mean we'd get more of Rachel Weisz's Melina Vostokov.

I mean, it's super obvious that Florence Pough's Yelena Belova is being positioned to step into a primary MCU role in the void left by Scarlett Johansson's departure, so we know we're covered there. But the future of the other Black Widow MVPs is still up in the air.

I don't know about you, but I'd love a Disney+ show that just has Weisz and Harbour doing funny/flirty spy shit. Seems like a slam dunk and, with Harbour eager to return to the role, it's certainly a possibility.