Marvel is finally, maybe, eventually making that Black Widow movie you asked for

That Black Widow movie you've been asking for just got one step closer to reality.

Variety reports that Jac Schaeffer has been hired to write the film, which would star Scarlett Johansson as the spy-turned-Avenger.

Mind you, the film's still got a ways to go before it becomes a reality. As of now, the Black Widow project doesn't have an official greenlight, let alone a release date.

Still, it's a promising development for a movie fans have been clamoring for since, oh, about 2008, when the character made her first big-screen appearance in Iron Man 2.

Schaeffer is the writer and director of TiMER, a 2009 sci-fi rom-com that essentially did "Hang the DJ" before Black Mirror did.

She's also written The Shower, an as-yet-unproduced screenplay that has Anne Hathaway attached to star, and is working on a Dirty Rotten Scoundrels remake titled Nasty Women. She previously worked with Disney on "Olaf's Frozen Adventure."

Her involvement makes the Black Widow standalone film the rare Marvel Cinematic Universe project with a female screenwriter. Others include Guardians of the Galaxy (Nicole Perlman) and the forthcoming Captain Marvel (Geneva Robertson-Dworet, who replaced Perlman and Meg LeFauve).

Johansson's Black Widow has appeared in five MCU films over the past decade, and will return later this year in Avengers: Infinity War. Despite her immense popularity, however, she's been relegated to a supporting player in the franchise.

Over the years, there's been a lot of talk about the possibility of a Black Widow movie. Johansson has said repeatedly that she'd like to make one, as has Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige. In 2016, Feige even got as far as saying he was "committing" to making it happen.

But until now, talk seemed to be as far as it got. When pressed, Feige would reassure fans that it was in development, but come up with excuses as to why it wasn't making much progress.

It got to be a bad look, especially as Marvel kept churning out one male-led superhero blockbuster after another. It got to be an even worse look once 20th Century Fox started promoting Red Sparrow, which had fans like us joking that it was the Black Widow movie Marvel wouldn't make.

For all that the MCU's done right, they've dragged their feet when it comes to female superheroes, letting rival DC beat them to the punch with Wonder Woman. DC's work paid off – Wonder Woman became the highest-grossing superhero flick of 2017.

Meanwhile, Marvel has been moving ahead with 2019's Captain Marvel, its 21st movie overall and its first one starring a woman.