Mark Ruffalo Says Hulk & Black Widow Are "Star-Crossed Lovers" & Marvel Fans Should Freak Out

Marvel movies have featured everything from lonely heroes to epic team-ups, but saving the world over and over again has caused one big thing — romantic superhero relationships — to fall by the wayside. The next Avengers movie promises to keep the supers as busy as ever, but star Mark Ruffalo hints that fans will get more Hulk and Black Widow in Avengers: Infinity War. As to whether or not 'shippers of the controversial couple will be swooning or crying at the pairing, Ruffalo won't say, but one thing's for sure: the Black Widow-Hulk ship sails on.

"They're star-crossed lovers," Ruffalo tells Bustle and fellow reporters during a visit to Infinity War's Atlanta set in 2017, speaking about Bruce Banner and Natasha Romanoff. "It'll be something they're dealing with for the rest of their living days, I think."

Cue the swooning 'shippers. Putting aside the fact that Ruffalo could be hinting at a major Avengers death — "living days" is a particularly ominous choice of words given that Infinity War pits the Avengers against their greatest, and most bloodthirsty, enemy yet in Thanos — fans should be beside themselves at hearing the "star-crossed lovers" part. Sure, going up against Thanos would to put a damper on any budding romance, but Ruffalo makes it sound like Bruce and Natasha won't make it to the next film, let alone a dinner date.

But there is some good news. "Whether it's requited or unrequited, I don't imagine that's gonna go away any time soon, in one iteration or another," Ruffalo says of Nat and Bruce's bond. So, clearly that connection is here to stay. The bad news, however, it may never even leave the dock. When Ruffalo says that the relationship could be "requited or unrequited," he seems to be foreshadowing an awkward reunion.

As fans will recall, Bruce and Natasha haven't been together since Avengers: Age of Ultron. It's been years since the Hulk flew away from Sokovia, leaving Black Widow behind. And while it was made clear that Bruce still has feelings for her in Thor: Ragnarok, the same can't exactly be said for Natasha. Black Widow is good at keeping her personal feelings private, and consequently there were absolutely no hints to her potential relationship with Bruce the last time fans saw her in Captain America: Civil War. Moreover, Avengers: Age of Ultron barely scratched the surface of the Hulk and Black Widow's potential romance. When Bruce and Natasha finally see each other again, it sounds like they won't really know what to make of their relationship .

Based on what Ruffalo and Scarlett Johansson have said about the future of the Hulk and Black Widow's romance, it seems that the two are headed for an awkward reunion and a tragic end. "I just finished Avengers: Infinity War. The first one. My character has this ongoing relationship with Mark Ruffalo's character," Johansson said on Inside the Actors Studio, as reported by Inverse. "I had such devastation that day. I don't know why... It was something about this character that Mark plays, and this is something that should feel so solid and suddenly doesn't."

Johansson has played Natasha long enough to know how to keep Marvel secrets under wraps, but even she can't disguise the peril Bruce and Natasha appear to be in. It's worth noting that Ruffalo is currently not listed among the cast of Avengers 4 on IMDB. Could this mean that the Hulk and Black Widow relationship is "devastating" because of an untimely death? Well, it might, but Tom Holland (Spider-Man) and Paul Rudd (Ant-Man) are also absent from the list, and both have MCU movies scheduled for release after Infinity War. So an IMDB cast list does not necessarily reveal the fate of any one character in the MCU.

Live or die, it's clear that the Hulk and Black Widow are not going to be ridding off into the sunset. But as long as Bruce and Natasha are back on the same planet, there's some hope for this MCU 'ship.

Additional reporting by Rachel Simon