Thunderbolts (annoying styled as Thunderbolts*) has a May 2nd, 2025 release date. A trailer is imminent, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see the first teaser at some point by the end of the year. However, you don’t have to wait that long to catch an admittedly blurry and shakey look at that first trailer. Marvel showed it privately at D23, and it promptly leaked. That’s not exactly a surprise, considering that Marvel’s The Fantastic Four and Captain America: Brave New World clips also leaked.
Those clips revealed a few exciting details about those two MCU projects, which are also set to premiere next year. The Thunderbolts clip is no different. It features some of the misfits who will be part of this new Thunderbolts team of not-quite-heroes.
More importantly, the leaked trailer also gives us our first look at a massive addition to the MCU roster, and it’s a Marvel character many of you have been dying to see on the big screen.
Before we look at the first Thunderbolts trailer, I’ll warn you that big spoilers will follow.
We’ve known the gist of Thunderbolts for years. Someone will assemble a team of former MCU villains and anti-heroes, or they’ll assemble themselves to fight a common threat.
The first Thunderbolts trailer nearly shows us the entire team. Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh) is obviously their leader, and she’s going through some sort of early mid-life crisis, trying to find purpose in life. She visits her father of sorts, Red Guardian (David Harbour), who appears to be equally “happy” with his life.
The trailer also shows US Agent (Wyatt Russell) experiencing what’s probably life after the events of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. He’s no longer a hero but still working on missions. We see that later when Yelena, US Agent, and Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen) find themselves in a mysterious location fighting each other. On that note, Ghost’s new costume is quite something.
That’s before Yelena realizes someone has sent them there to tie up loose ends. All of them have been working on certain shady missions for someone, and that person wants to eliminate them.
This is where we meet the character I teased earlier. Lewis Pullman’s Bob, aka Robert Reynolds, is at that location. Apparently, he’s also on someone’s kill list. Robert Reynolds will then become both a superhero, the Sentry, and a villain, the Void. However, the first Thunderbolts trailer reveals none of that. All we see is a scene where a hit team is shooting at Bob, but Bob doesn’t appear to get injured.
This isn’t the first time Pullman plays a “Bob.” We saw him do it before in Top Gun: Maverick. Different Bob, different mission.
Back to Thunderbolts, the leaked clip also shows us Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) in surprising clothing. He’s dressed in a suit in various scenes, suggesting he might have taken up politics. My favorite trailer scene is something I never thought I’d want to see in a Marvel movie. Bucky uses a regular dishwasher to clean his powerful arm. Of course, he does.
Whatever he’s up to, Bucky will assist the Thunderbolts in some fighting capacity.
As for Taskmaster (Olga Kurylenko), I couldn’t specifically spot her — that’s how bad the quality of the trailer is. Taskmaster probably appears in the scene that introduces a familiar countess.
Finally, the clip also gives us a look at Val (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), the obvious mastermind of mind. She’s probably the villain of the film, and according to some leaks, she might be occupying the former Avengers building.
We saw Val here and there in the MCU already, as she appeared in all sorts of scenes, teasing that she was recruiting people with specific qualities. As a reminder, she appeared in Black Widow, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. She came in contact with the Thunderbolts in one way or another already.
The first trailer doesn’t give us the film’s larger plot, however. It’s clear the Thunderbolts are assembling for some sort of bigger mission. We just have to wait and see what that is. Also, Red Guardian is psyched about the new team, whatever the mission.
As for that strange Thunderbolts* title, could Marvel call this crossover Dark Avengers by the time it hits theaters next May? ComicBookMovie speculates that can explain the asterisk. That would be an amazing surprise, given the lack of Avengers action in the Multiverse Saga so far. After all, even the trailer teases that possibility by giving us a “careful who you assemble” quote.
You’ll find the leaked trailer on X, as seen below, and on other social media platforms.
