According to Avengers: Endgame directors, Joe and Anthony Russo, Black Widow's story during almost involved her running an organization tasked with caring for children orphaned after Thanos' snap.
In an interview on the Slate's The Gist, Anthony Russo said, "One thing that we talked about a lot–and I thought was really profound, but it was almost too large of an idea for us to wrangle, but we did try for a while–is just the idea that one-quarter of all children have no parents."
The directors went on to talk about how they'd planned for Black Widow to lead a Washington D.C.-based organization in charge of caring for these orphans.
Since Thanos wiped out half of all life in the universe, one quarter of children in households with two parents would've lost both parents in the snap, and half of children in single parent households would've lost their only caregiver.
While the directors didn't elaborate on why the idea was dropped, it's worth noting that Black Widow played a somewhat similar role in film as the main person coordinating Earth's remaining heroes.
While the Avengers made the ultimate sacrifice to save Hawkeye's family in Endgame, Scarlett Johansson is reportedly set to return as Black Widow in a solo film that will explore her origins and could be released as soon as next year.
Directed by Joe and Anthony Russo, Avengers: Endgame stars Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man, Chris Evans as Captain America, Mark Ruffalo as Bruce Banner, Chris Hemsworth as Thor, Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow, Jeremy Renner as Hawkeye, Brie Larson as Captain Marvel, Paul Rudd as Ant-Man, Don Cheadle as War Machine, Karen Gillan as Nebula, Danai Gurira as Okoye and Bradley Cooper as Rocket, with Gwyneth Paltrow Pepper Potts, Jon Favreau as Happy Hogan, Benedict Wong as Wong, Tessa Thompson as Valkyrie and Josh Brolin as Thanos. The film is in theaters now.
(via The Wrap)