MANILA, Philippines – Disney has postponed once again the release of its upcoming film for Marvel "Black Widow" because of challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic to the movie industry.
"Black Widow" was initially going to be released in May 2020, however, the pandemic forced Disney's Marvel Studios to postpone it to November.
The movie will now take the May 2021 release slot of "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings" in the hopes of succeeding in the summer box office.
With the adjustment, 2020 marks the first time since 2009 that a movie in the Marvel Cinematic Universe has not been released during the calendar year.
As a result, Marvel has moved "Shang-Chi" to a July 2021 release while "The Eternals" has been postponed from February 2021 to November 2021.
Reshuffled calendar
After seeing the restrained performance of rival studio's "Tenet" by Christopher Nolan, which was expected to be a box-office hit, the pandemic has forced Disney to reshuffle the release calendar of its other studio properties.
"Death on the Nile," based on the Agatha Christie mystery novel starring Kenneth Branagh and produced by the newly-acquired 20th Century, will move from October to becoming Disney's Christmas release this year.
The highly-anticipated "West Side Story" remake by Steven Spielberg, produced 20th Century and Spielber's Amblin, will be delayed for an entire year and is set to come out in December 2021.
Other Disney-owned films that saw calendar changes include "The King's Man" and "The Empty Man," which were moved up to earlier dates, and "Deep Water" which was delayed from November 2020 to August 2021.
Some films retained their release dates such as Pixar's "Soul" (November 20) and "Free Man" (December 11) starring Ryan Reynolds.
However, Disney has not announced if any of these films will be moving to Disney+, as it did for "Artemis Fowl" and "Mulan."