Eternals introduced Kit Harington's Dane Whitman, and it's hard to shake the feeling that he'd have been better served joining Sersi and her fellow immortals on their mission. Still, a post-credits scene at least teased his eventual transformation into Black Knight.
After watching helplessly while the woman he loves was taken from Earth by the Celestial Arishem, Dane contemplated picking up the Ebony Blade, only for a mysterious voice to ask whether he was ready for that.
Mahershala Ali's Blade was behind the voice that confronted the teacher, and the assumption was that Black Knight's story would continue in the Daywalker's planned solo movie. Since then, we've learned Dane was set to be a lead character in Blade, only for him to fall victim to the now-cancelled reboot's many rewrites.
In a new interview with Josh Horowitz, Harington was asked whether Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige laid out plans for Black Knight beyond Eternals.
"I met Kevin for a general [meeting] a while before that came up, and he said, 'Look, we’d really love to find something,'" the Game of Thrones alum recalled. "And then it was presented as, like, this is—you know how they do in the Marvel universe. They’ll throw a character in and then see if it goes anywhere, or see if they introduce him [somewhere]. And in the end it didn’t."
"I think that’s always the way of things: they’re sort of testing to see if there’s something they want to play with," Harington continued. "And there was always the idea it might."
He added, "I think he’s a really interesting character. Talking of addiction and all that, I think there’s something fascinating to play with the Black Knight, and I felt this from the start: that the Ebony Blade is one that he uses and then gets bloodlust, and I think there’s an interesting story of someone going from hero to villain right there."
Harington concluded by expressing a desire to reprise the role, suggesting he hasn't wiped his hands with the MCU despite any disappointment with his introduction. "So, you know, anyone from Marvel watching, but I do think it could be a fascinating story. But they’ve got so much [to work with]."
Before Eternals was released in theaters in 2021, excitement for the movie was significant. It had Oscar-winner Chloé Zhao at the helm, and looked set to add a new superhero team to the MCU that was even more star-studded than the cast of The Avengers.
After the reviews poured in, everyone was shocked to see it deemed Marvel Studios' first "Rotten" movie on Rotten Tomatoes. Throw in the fact that it dropped during the final months of the pandemic, and the blockbuster struggled to make its mark at the box office, grossing only $402 million worldwide. With that, plans for the characters were abandoned, and Black Knight was among those who fell by the wayside.
You can hear more from Harington in the player below.