Despite the nearly constant galactic stakes of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, love has fueled most of the characters at the heart of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The MCU seems to love a tragic romance most of all, indulging the loss of a specific loved one to drive the overall narrative forward.
That’s what makes the potential relationship at the heart of Eternals so exciting. With the Black Knight and Sersi both confirmed to appear in the film, the MCU could be bringing the tumultuous and tragic romance between Sersi and Black Knight to the big screen.
Across nearly a thousand years, the Black Knight has been a figure in the mainstream Marvel continuity. The first Black Knight, Sir Percival, was a knight of Camelot who wielded the cursed Ebony Blade. In the modern-day, Percival's descendant Dane Whitman is the new Black Knight. Dane quickly became a valuable ally and eventual member of the Avengers, fighting alongside them against many enemies. However, the sanity threatening effects of the Ebony Blade often pushed Dane to the edge of reason. Despite this, he eventually became a field leader for the Avengers during Captain America's extended absence.
While Dane's family reaches back centuries, Sersi herself spans a majority of recorded human history. Sersi is one of the Eternals, an ancient race of superhuman figures created by the Celestials. Finding secret homes on Earth, Sersei stood out from the rest of her kind by harboring a deep-seated love for humanity. Gifted with unnaturally long life by her origins, Sersi lived among humanity throughout much of recorded history. In the modern-day, she fought alongside her fellow Eternals to battle against the return of the Deviants before joining the Avengers in the '90s.
Working together as Avengers, Sersi and Black Knight became romantically involved. Soon however, Sersi was targeted by the Proctor, a mysterious madman with a vendetta against the Eternal. The pair tried to work together to fight back against Proctor’s influence, but even attempts by fellow Eternal Ikaris to bond them together for strength only made things more contentious between the pair. Proctor was eventually revealed to be an alternate universe version of Black Knight, furious at Sersi and consumed by madness because of the Ebony Blade. This version of Dane was targeting every version of Sersi across the multiverse.
Things were only complicated by Dane's attraction to the Inhuman, Crystal. Crystal was then trying to reconcile with her husband, Quicksilver, but shared Dane's feelings. Eventually, Sersi was forced to kill Proctor with his own version of the Ebony Blade. Deciding to leave the Marvel Universe to restore her mind and heal from his machinations, Dane joined Sersi and traveled to another reality. The pair would eventually return to the Marvel Universe, but the bond formed by Ikaris was broken in the process. The two drifted apart, eventually leading to the pair going down different paths and leading different lives.
Following the events of Avengers: Endgame, most of the MCU's major romantic relationships have been resolved. The will they/won’t they relationship between Tony Stark and Pepper Potts led to their marriage and the birth of their daughter, while the tragic romance of Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter reached a surprisingly happy conclusion thanks to time-travel.
With Spider-Man and MJ leaving the MCU, the MCU is going to need some more titanic romances to replace those, and the love between Dane and Sersi could be perfect for that. They already come with inherent tragedy baked into their relationship, since the immortal Sersi will probaly outlive Dane thanks to her status as an Eternal.
This could even potentially tie into the Inhumans considering Crystal's involvement in the story. But to be honest, the story already has enough drama without Crystal's involvement. Dane’s own potential madness brought on by the Ebony Blade gives him a dark side to the relationship as well. Even a variant of the corrupted Proctor could play a role in their story, as a corrupted Dane or as another version of him from the upcoming multiverse.
These star-crossed lovers could have been waiting for centuries to find one another, only for Sersi to have to contend with the fragile mortality of her love. If the MCU is looking for a new epic romance to explore, then the love between an immortal woman and the human man she loves could easily be a sci-fi/fantasy take on the Captain America/Peggy Carter relationship and give their romance enough drama to launch a thousand ships.
Directed by Chloé Zhao with a screenplay by Matthew and Ryan Firpo, Eternals stars Richard Madden as Ikaris, Kumail Nanjiani as Kingo, Lauren Ridloff as Makkari, Brian Tyree Henry as Phastos, Salma Hayek as Ajak, Lia McHugh as Sprite, Don Lee as Gilgamesh, Angelina Jolie as Thena, Barry Keoghan as Druig, Gemma Chan as Sersi and Kit Harington as Dane Whitman, aka the Black Knight. The film arrives in theaters on Nov 6, 2020.
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