A quick look at the contents of Thunderbolts: The Saga of Yelena Belova will likely tell you everything you know about Yelena’s position in the Marvel Universe. Comprised of Russian-centric team-ups and issues of her big “sister’s” solo books, Saga of Yelena Belova illustrates the history of a character utilized almost primarily as a supporting character.
Though her first appearance was in a stray issue of Inhumans, she got her first focus in Black Widow (1999) and its follow up, Black Widow (2001), which are unquestionably Yelena-centric stories (she is introduced and utilized as a foil for Natalia), but even in the lone issue which bears her name she plays support.
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These stories don’t show why she is always cast as second fiddle. Each of the 15 issues collected here present her as a capable, compelling character. Introduced as the second Black Widow, Yelena was meant to be a perfect foil for Romanova; also a graduate of the sinister Red Room, she was presented as a sort of new model for a post vacated by the turncoat Avenger. While she never proves to be her sister’s better, she’s always calm, confident, and deadly – even if a little naive.
The first two Black Widow miniseries – by writers Devin Grayson and Greg Rucka, with JG Jones and Scott Hampton providing pencils – don’t manage much other than introducing and playing with the character. They were early Marvel Knights offerings, excuses to play with more mature (read: narratively bleak) themes in that imprint’s effort to provide space for more serious stories. They aren’t great stories: they’re sloppily told and provide muddled motivations for their characters at best. Still, they introduced a character with great potential.
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That potential was largely squandered until her introduction into the MCU; The Saga of Yelena Belova does not present a chronology of her limited exploits, but it isn’t too far from it. Until the lead-up to 2021’s Black Widow film, she had only appeared in 30-odd issues in 20 years (most of them as a support in Secret Warriors). Putting the character in the literal spotlight of cinema greatly boosted her usage in the comics.
Though she plays a central role in 2021’s Winter Guard series, she is used as a foil to the titular team, a role she shares with Red Guardian. The book is more concerned with Guardian’s McGuffin hard drives than it is with character development on any level, and while all those characters make for a lot of bombastic action (including some political intrigue from Dracula), it’s another clear case of Belova being used conditionally rather than pivotally.
Finally, in issues from the 2020 volume of Black Widow, we’re allowed limited but character-developing peeks at Belova as one of Romanova’s team; in that series, the characters took on a more sisterly relationship, and their banter makes Belova feel more realized (even though these moments between them are short).
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As with a lot of Marvel’s Saga of. . . books, what Thunderbolts: The Saga of Yelena Belova is more a sampler of the character rather than a chronicle. It’s built up of snippets and spotlights, disregarding inclusions like Belova’s own White Widow series a couple of years ago in favor of a tempered look at a character less likely to share the limelight with her Thunderbolts peers. We can hope that her role in the MCU will spark more focus on her in the comics, but it seems more likely that she’ll ever be a supporting character, however bold and promising she may be.
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