Title – Thunderbolts*/The New Avengers (2025)

Director – Jake Schreier (Paper Towns)

Cast – Florence Pugh, Sebastian Stan, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Lewis Pullman, David Harbour, Wyatt Russell

Plot – Forced to work together after coming into contact with Valentina Allegra de Fontaine (Louis-Dreyfus), a rag-tag collection of anti-heroes including Yelena Belova (Pugh) and Bucky Barnes (Stan) join forces to stop a new global threat.

“We can find a way together”

Review by Eddie on 09/05/2025

Well the cats out of the bag, in what I understand to be an industry first, Marvel’s newest blockbuster release Thunderbolts* is now officially known as The New Avengers, a move that has clearly been pre-planned but potentially rushed into action as their latest offering balances on that tricky line of the success and failure debate after its first week in theatres around the world.

An undeniable success when it comes to some of the best Marvel reviews of recent years and audience sentiment that’s currently seeing director Jake Schreier’s feature sitting in the high 7’s in IMDB ratings, Thunderbolts* does manage to mess with the stereotypical Marvel formula enough to ensure that while it feels familiar, there’s still fun to be had here, particularly in the fact it isn’t obsessed with ending its final act in a humongous battle for the planets survival that has become a tried and true staple for multiple decades.

Turning its attention to bringing together a ragtag group of antiheros that are quite clearly being presented by Marvel as key players in the future of this comic centric universe, Thunderbolts* is built around an as to be expected top-notch performance from Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova who must work together with David Harbour as her limousine driving father Alexei Shostakov, Sebastian Stan as a down on his luck Bucky Barnes, Wyatt Russell as a rent a hero Captain America rip-off John Walker, Hannah John-Kamen as Ava Starr and Lewis Pullman as the mysterious Bob who have all had run-ins with Julia Louis-Dreyfus’s corporate baddie Valentina Allegra de Fontaine.

Kicking things off in great fashion as Belova completes a task while she battles her own mental demons and life crisis and wasting little time drawing all the key players into an unplanned meeting in a top secret bunker/research facility, Thunderbolts* keeps things moving across its 2 hour running time (including a significant post-credits sequence you should endure until the end for) and while there is a sense the spectacle and wow factor could’ve been more memorable overall, the chemistry between Schreier’s cast members and their flawed but interesting characters ensures there’s more to invest in here than most of Marvel’s post-Avengers outings.

While there’s a lot to enjoy here in a throwaway sense, you can’t help but feel as though Marvel’s gamble on relying heavily on this contingent of characters and character arcs is still up for debate as a right or wrong decision.

It’s hard to suggest that these key players have the same spark and intriguing elements as a Tony Stark, God of Thunder, Captain America or Bruce Banner and while Thunderbolts* surface level examination of mental health and the power of friendship brings some new avenues to generic formulas, only time will tell as to whether audience embrace this new era to any close levels as has been done previously as the mountain to climb for Marvel remains well and truly unconquered as of this moment.

Final Say –

Thunderbolts* is an above average piece of comic inspired fair but still lacks the same magic and creativity of Marvel’s best works. A step in the right direction while being a far cry from the pinnacles of what has come before it, Thunderbolts* remains an unknown in these early days before Marvel throws everything at reigniting there once indestructible cinematic universe.

3 1/2 inopportune press conferences out of 5