Marvel Studios’ Infinity Saga Collector’s Edition offers a wealth of previously unseen material from the past eleven years of MCU history, much of which shows the superhero saga going in some very different directions from the stories we ultimately got. In a newly surfaced deleted scene from last year’s Avengers: Infinity War, for instance, we see the return of Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk at the film’s Wakanda-based climax.
Though the Jade Giant was famously absent for most of the Marvel megahit, co-writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely just recently revealed their early plans to have Bruce Banner’s alter ego burst out of the Hulkbuster suit during Infinity War’s final stretch. The above footage looks to have been taken from this alternate history, too, while also serving as a callback to the romance between Bruce and Black Widow.
While Bruce and Nat’s relationship in Avengers: Age of Ultron remains one of the 2015 film’s more divisive elements, Markus and McFeely explained in an interview earlier this year that they still tried to find ways of bringing their history into the last two Avengers movies. Apparently, the Russo Brothers even shot a scene for Avengers: Infinity War where the two heroes hash things out, but ultimately, it was decided that any material that wasn’t “A-plot” had to be left on the cutting room floor.
As it stands, it’s unclear if we’ll ever see Black Widow and Hulk share the screen again, but for what it’s worth, it looks like neither hero is done with the MCU just yet. In Bruce’s case, there’s a good chance that Ruffalo’s character will return for the upcoming She-Hulk TV show. And though Nat met a sad fate in Avengers: Endgame, you can catch her next year in the long-awaited Black Widow solo movie, which hits theaters on May 1st.