Thunderbolts star David Harbour is teasing how the Marvel Cinematic Universe group of antiheroes and villains will be forming in the upcoming team-up movie. The film was officially announced by Marvel at this year's San Diego Comic-Con, with the studio then confirming the roster of its team members at the D23 Expo. Thunderbolts will feature returning MCU actors Harbour as Red Guardian, Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova/Black Widow, Sebastian Stan as Bucky Barnes/Winter Soldier, Wyatt Russell as John Walker/US Agent, Hannah John-Kamen as Ghost, Olga Kurylenko as Taskmaster, and Julia Louis-Dreyfus as Valentina Allegra de Fontaine.
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With a July 2024 release date, Thunderbolts will be the final film in the MCU's Phase 5 film and TV slate. However, Marvel has been teasing the Thunderbolts team for years. Louis-Dreyfus has made appearances in Black Widow and The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. She's already sent Yelena to kill Clint Barton/Hawkeye and recruited US Agent to her cause, making her the likely leader of the Thunderbolts, at least in the MCU. The comic version of the team was originally formed by Baron Zemo, who has not been announced for the film, and another iteration of the Thunderbolts became the Dark Avengers led by Norman Osborn following the Secret Invasion event.
Given that the Thunderbolts movie can't simply follow the same formula of the Avengers coming together, there are going to have to be some surprises in the film. As the movie was only recently announced, details are still limited. However, Harbour was asked by ComicBook.com how the team would be forming. Check out his response below:
That is one of the initial mysteries. I just made a joke about it's like Dungeons and Dragons, where you meet in a tavern and it's like there's a dwarf drinking a beer and then there's like an elvish figure over there, we all come together and then there's this ghost… it's not gonna happen like that, I don't think.
But I think that's one of the mysteries of the movie is what is their relationship, and as you say, there is a lot of exciting things as you wrap up the next phase in terms of sort of what their part of the whole universe is in this random, chaotic way. So, you know, we can't say too much at this point, but they're an exciting introduction of this team together again, that's going to be a lot of fun.
The fun, as Harbour mentions it, will likely come out of the clashing personalities of the team. While most of the announced members of the Thunderbolts have reformed in some way, it's still a group of characters with morally dubious pasts. A team like this should not be able to function together, and the fun will come out of seeing how they inevitably overcome that. While the premise of Thunderbolts is similar to Suicide Squad, there are key differences between the two.
For example, an advantage Thunderbolts has over Suicide Squad is that all of the characters have already been introduced to the MCU and are known by audiences. The movie doesn't have to bog itself down in exposition and can instead focus on making the moment the team comes together as fun and unique as possible. As Harbour suggests, the chaotic nature of all of these characters uniting is going to be the draw of the movie.