Marvel has just released a new epic trailer for next year’s Thunderbolts* almost out of the blue, but if we’re being honest, it’s an incredible surprise based on the action we’ve just seen in the three and a half minute tease of what’s to come in May 2025. Julia Louis-Dreyfus is putting together her own squad of misfits and miscreants, and they’re going to need to work together if they want to make it through. Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova is front and center in the trailer, as her Black Widow is struggling to find her place in the world, wandering like a lost sheep. Maybe a team-up will help?
The confirmed cast for the huge ensemble movie alongside Louis-Dreyfus as Valentina Allegra de Fontaine includes Sebastian Stan as Bucky Barnes, David Harbour as Red Guardian, Wyatt Russell as U.S. Agent, Hannah John-Kamen as Ghost, and Olga Kurylenko as Taskmaster. Additionally, Geraldine Viswanathan has replaced Ayo Edebiri in an undisclosed role, and Lewis Pullman is continuing the Bob Cinematic Universe, taking on the role of a new Bob, following Top Gun: Maverick, after Steven Yeun’s exit as Sentry, due to conflicts with scheduling. Written by Eric Pearson, Lee Sung Jin, and Joanna Calo, and directed by Schreier, Thunderbolts is certainly shaping up to take the MCU in an interesting new direction. And maybe soon, we’ll find out what that asterisk is all about, too.
What Can We Expect From ‘Thunderbolts*’?
Earlier this year, in an interview with the New York Times, Louis-Dreyfus mentioned that she’d been working on increasing her physicality in the movie, and hailed the focus on practical filmmaking which would mark a notable shift from the CGI-heavy films we’ve seen in recent times. Those films, like Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, were criticized for their lack of depth, both physically and emotionally, but bringing the action to a more grounded and natural feeling seems to be the best course of action.
“It’s very well organized. Very methodical. And I don’t mean that in a negative way. Particularly on this film, they’re very much focused on, frankly, the human story, believe it or not. They’re trying to sort of go back to their roots, as it were. And so there’s a lot of focus on that.
They’re trying to stay away from as much C.G.I. or whatever as possible, so that the stunts are, like, everywhere.
And in fact, I had to do a couple. Well, I’m making this out to sound like I’m flying through the air like Captain America or whatever, but I’m not. It’s just a very, very, very, very brief stunt.”
