Superhero: M - violence

Director: Jake Schreier

Starring: Florence Pugh, Sebastian Stan, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Lewis Pullman

Runtime: 2hr 7min

8/10

I’d kind of fallen off the Marvel movie/TV show overload wagon, but Florence Pugh reeled me back in – and I’m glad she did.

Thunderbolts* follows a group of anti-heroes who are trying to clear their respective records and dark pasts, reluctantly teaming up to face a bigger threat.

Making Florence Pugh the lead of a film is always the right choice, and Marvel lets her character, Yelena Belova, (a former child assassin contracted to clean up Oscorp’s messes) steal the show.

This film also features The Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan), U.S. Agent (John Walker), Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), Taskmaster (Olga Kurylenko), the Red Guardian (David Harbour) and Bob (Lewis Pullman) - who is a standout character even though he is totally just a guy.

My favourite is the puller of strings and high-up government official (maybe president?), Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus who absolutely chews up every scene, somehow providing validity to the less compelling antagonistic plotline as she desperately tries not to get impeached.

Marvel has finally returned to what made it successful in the first place: character-driven narratives. The natural team building, chemistry and clashes between the Thunderbolts* brings a lot of humour, but there are also some deep dives into character psyche on show.

Is it sort of superheroes fight depression? Sure. But interesting imagery and good writing makes it work and keeps it captivating.

It has a lot of anti-Avengers (2012) vibes, which I enjoyed.

Some of the jokes rely on knowledge of past films, however, to enjoy the emotional core and overall plot, you don’t have to do any Marvel back-catalogue homework.

Action scenes are handled with style, with a particularly epic motorbike chase. The film also feels as if it has its own aesthetic, standing out from the slew of superhero slop of recent years.

The asterisk (*) payoff from the title is satisfying and cleverly handled.

There’s not much else I can say without giving away spoilers, but there are mid credits and end credits scenes, and I’m now looking forward to the next one – hopefully Marvel remembers the lesson that the best advertisement for your next movie is making good movies.