The Awesome Black Widow/Captain America Battle That Nearly Made It Into Age of Ultron

Ever since Age of Ultron got its home release, we’ve heard about a lot of scenes that didn’t make it into the movie (and we’ve also desperately wanted Whedon’s fabled “Director’s Cut” to get released). But this recent animatic from the film adds another missing moment to the pile.

The short pre-viz sequence was recently uploaded to YouTube by Federico D’Alessandro of Westlawn Films, who provides storyboards and animatic sequences for many Marvel Studios films. It’s an extended take on the bridge rescue scene, which sees Thor fly to the aid of some tumbling pedestrians after they fall over the edge of a bridge damaged by Ultron’s attack on Sokovia. It looks like the full version of the sequence would’ve included Cap and Black Widow going to town on some Ultron drones after the civilians escaped. Check it out in full below:

That stun baton grab at the end. Oh my god.

There’s no reason given for why the great little action sequence was cut from the final film (or, given that it exists as an animatic, probably not even filmed at all)—but given that Scarlett Johansson was heavily pregnant during Age of Ultron’s filming, such an intensive sequence may have been cut to trim down her time being involved in stunt work on the shoot. At least we got to see what might have been!

[Via Comicbook.com]