Black Widow Trailer Teases Return of Major Marvel Villains

Black Widow is set to be the first film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Phase Four, and with any luck, the movie will hit theaters in May as planned. The final trailer for the upcoming film was released earlier this week and featured some exciting new footage. In fact, one eagle-eyed viewer noticed a Marvel easter egg that might hint at the return of some major comic book villains. According to Charles Murphy, host of @PodcastMurphy, you can see “AIM” near Yelena (Florence Pugh) in a shot that features her being tied down.

“Through the magic of flipping the picture, you might see the word AIM above Yelena’s noggin. This is almost certainly AFTER the big, final fight since she’s wearing the same outfit,” Murphy wrote. A.I.M. stands for Advanced Idea Mechanics, and according to Marvel.com, it’s an “organization of brilliant scientists and their hirelings dedicated to the acquisition of power and the overthrow of all government by technological means.” You can check out the image in the tweet below:

“A.I.M. was organized during World War II as the scientific research division of the subversive military organization Hydra. In the late 1960s, A.I.M. seceded from Hydra because of political differences and began independent operations. A.I.M. first came to public attention when it was incorporated as an international cartel dealing with the development and marketing of new technological products. It supplied hardware and weapons to governmental and quasi-governmental agencies. Sometime after this Colonel Nick Fury of S.H.I.E.L.D. exposed A.I.M. to be a subversive organization. Since then, all of A.I.M.’s activities have been covert,” Marvel.com explains.

Black Widow is set to explore the time in Natasha Romanoff’s (Scarlett Johansson) life between the events of Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War and Pugh herself has said that she’s excited for young women to see as the solo venture is poised to be an empowering one.

“Cate [Shortland] was so good at being so vigilant about keeping this story raw and painful,” Pugh explained. “It’s about emotions, and it’s about these broken girls trying to come back together again, and trying to fix something that happened. It’s about fixing yourself, and how you do that. As an idea for a Marvel film, and as a young woman, it’s like, ‘Oh, my God, this is amazing.’ Young women are going to see this, and they’re going to watch Scarlett in her element, and they’re going to watch this storyline, and that’s only a positive thing.”

Black Widow is set to hit theaters on May 1st.