I enjoyed a Marvel movie again

Is Marvel back? (Spoiler free until it's not!)

I have subjected myself to a lot of Marvel slop since seeing Spider-Man: No Way Home twice in one night December 16, 2021.

Doctor Strange: Multiverse of Madness. Thor: Love and Thunder. Secret Invasion. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantummania. Captain America: Brave New World.

And that’s only what I would probably consider the worst of the worst.

I’ve never gone back for a second viewing even at home on any of them, let alone in theaters as I used to do excitedly.

I’m almost certainly going to see Thunderbolts* in theaters again.

To be honest, it’s thrilling to even write that, to have even thought it last night as I eagerly voice-noted friends who’d also gone out to release night showings, one of whom had not kept up on the MCU over the past few years, following my viewing.

For four years, I’ve subjected myself to the MCU’s poor attempts to find it’s footing as it entered the post-Avengers era, often saving friends from having to do the same (and only surviving thanks to The Ringerverse’s Midnight Boys).

I pretty successfully entered Thunderbolts* Thursday night with no expectations. I’d refused to get my hopes up for months, only having them incrementally raised after seeing the trailer — one of the most successful Marvel has done in ages, I’d say — before every movie I’ve gone to in the past month and seeing more general audience reviews start to creep out this week.

Not even my beloveds, Florence Pugh and Sebastian Stan, leading the cast could sway me to be truly excited in the same way I was back in the late 2010s and early 2020s when the likes of Avengers: Endgame, Spider-Man: Far From Home and several other bangers (the last of the MCU, maybe, because for as good as it was, Thunderbolts* still wasn’t that level) were released.

Imagine my surprise, then, and the way my hopes took a sharp swing up, when I arrived at my AMC theater and there was a line to get in.

Obviously not everyone was there for Thunderbolts*. Sinners is still in theaters, after all.

But my showing (8:45 p.m. Thursday, IMAX) was full.

Let’s get to the actual movie, shall we?

— Mostly thematic SPOILERS begin below this image —

My biggest takeaway from Thunderbolts* was how successfully it managed to create emotional stakes around characters which even the most devoted of MCU audiences have spent very little time with.

Yelena’s been around for a movie (Black Widow) and a minor Disney+ TV show cameo (Hawkeye). John Walker’s only been on TV (Captain America & The Winter Soldier). Ghost was a second-tier villain in a movie that came out 7 years ago (Ant-Man & The Wasp).

Bob we’d never met, though I was instantly endeared to him as he was 1) portrayed by Lewis Pullman and 2) an emotional unstable brunette man who gives lover boy vibes.

I don’t believe it would be an overstatement to say the movie would’ve been a total flop if it had been unsuccessful at creating those emotional stakes seeing as, well, they’re the whole plot of the movie.

What I think made it successful is that these are the most human Marvel characters have felt since the early origin movies of the original Avengers, and Marvel let them be just that — human.

Everyone gets an emotional moment in the film, but Yelena (Florence Pugh) understandably gets several, most notably being the sidewalk moment with her father, Alexei/Red Guardian (David Harbour), a rant I likened to Pride and Prejudice’s “I’m 27 years old” one:

Yelena: Daddy, I'm so alone. I don't have anything anymore. All I do is sit, and look at my phone, and think of all the terrible things I've done; and then I go to work, and then I drink, come home to no-one, then I sit and think of all the terrible things I've done again and ag...

Alexei: Yelena, stop. We all have things that we regret.

Yelena: Yes. But I have so many! [bursts into tears]

Alexei: Yelena, when I look at you, I don't see your mistakes.

These are not emotional moments like “I want to be an Avenger and I’m letting Tony Stark down!” (sorry, Peter Parker) or “Do I want to even be a hero because how am I gonna help when aliens come back to New York?!”

Albeit a few days removed, I can’t remember a significant, unrelated reference to any of the multiversal shenanigans going on elsewhere in the MCU, or really any storyline we know is at least somewhat concurrently happening until, of course, the “Captain America is suing us” bit and the Fantastic Four enters the atmosphere in the second post-credits scene.

And that’s SO REFRESHING!

The other part of this movie that I think makes it so successful is that it feels like everyone from creative to cast was on the same page about the role each character was supposed to play. No one feels bigger or smaller than they should be or out of their depth.

For better or worse, teams always have archetypal characters in them.

The Comic Relief: Red Guardian/Alexei (David Harbour). The Wanna-Be Leader: John Walker (Wyatt Russell). The ACTUAL leader: Yelena (Florence Pugh). The Rogue Tactician Who’s Begrudgingly on the Team: Ghost (NAME). The Wizened Vet: Bucky/The Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan).

The third and final thing that I thought worked in the movie, though I recognize may not work for everyone is that it didn’t culminate in some big traditional fight and instead in an emotional sequence about conquering one’s own internal villain and relying on the help of others to do so.

Call the group hug corny, but we’re a society that is deeply detached from healthy interpersonal relationships, which is only making our own individual struggles that much more sizable.

I appreciated a movie putting that on screen, and that it wasn’t a perfect resolution, either — Bob hasn’t learned to be Sentry without calling back the Void even 14 months later.

All in all, is Thunderbolts* The New Avengers a complete return to form for the MCU?

No. I don’t know that we’ll ever get back to what Phases 1-3 felt like.

But for what we had been getting recently from the studio that once gave us such thrilling movie-going experiences and heartwarming moments, this felt like a return to form.

Land Fantastic Four later this summer, and Marvel might be back.

Might.

What I Leik’d: April

Late on this! The NFL Draft ate up my April newslettering time. So there will be another May edition, too, and my May “What I’m Leiking.” Here’s last month!

Movies:

• Sinners (2025, dir. Ryan Coogler)

  • If somehow you haven’t gone to see this yet… stop reading and literally go right now. Yes I know this newsletter is going out at 9:30 p.m. on a Monday. I don’t care.

• Revenge of the Sith (2005)

  • Magical first cinema viewing for the 20th anniversary

• Pride and Prejudice (2005)

  • See above note

• Warefare (2025, dir. Alex Garland)

TV Shows:

• The Pitt (HBO)

  • Stayed up until literally 5 a.m. binging most of this show… that lack of sleep fucked me up for a week

• The Last of Us (HBO)

• Hacks (HBO)

• The Studio (Apple TV+)

• Andor (Disney+)

Music:

• “party 4 u” by charli xcx

  • … okay but who isn’t into this right now

• Sinners Original Motion Picture Score by Ludwig Göransson

  • Particularly “I Lied to You” performed by Miles Caton

• "Relationships” by HAIM

• All Taylor Swift

Podcasts:

• The Sports Gossip Show

  • Particularly on the Bill Belichick/Jordan Hudson drama!

• The Mina Kimes Show Featuring Lenny

Books:

• Dear Dolly by Dolly Alderton