David Harbour Likens His Black Widow Role to Captain America

As expected, Marvel Studios brought Cate Shortland and most of the cast of Black Widow to San Diego Comic-Con earlier tonight to unveil castings and some tidbits of footage. Before long, it was revealed that Stranger Things star David Harbour would be playing a character by the name Alexei, who was later confirmed by Disney to in fact be the Russain hero known as Red Guardian.

We had a chance to catch up with Harbour after the panel and he reminded us how his character is essentially the Russian version of Chris Evan's Captain America.

"That's one of the things I really like about this character," Harbour reflects. "There's an openness to interpretation. The one thing we do is know is that he's the counterpart to Captain Americaon the Russian Soviet side, but that way we have a lot of play with who he is and we are playing with him."

"Initially when I heard the pitch she [director Cate Shortland] was like 'He's this and he's this,'" the actor continued. "And I was like 'Yeah, I got it.'...he spins and he twists and he turns in ways that make sense and in ways I don't expect characters to go there. I expect characters to be a color or a flavor and we get to know them and this guy is really rich."

Ahead of Stranger Things 3 earlier this month, we sat down with Harbour and even then the actor couldn't stop raving about Shortland and the production team on the film.

"This woman, Cate Shortland, who is directing this movie is one of the best directors I've ever worked with," Harbour told ComicBook.com "She's so, so smart, and makes such beautiful indie movies. The fact that you'd put someone like that at the helm of one of these huge action movies — and she pays such attention to the story and such attention to character — speaks volumes."

"The fact that these guys are so good at what they do, and so passionate about what they do, it feels tremendous," he continued. "I'm very, very happy with the situation, working on it now. It's on a scale and on a passionate level unlike anything I've ever done."

What major surprises are in store for Black Widow? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below or by tweeting me at @AdamBarnhardt!

Black Widow hits theaters May 1, 2020. Spider-Man: Far From Home is now in theaters while Avengers: Endgame will get a digital release July 30th ahead of physical media on August 13th.