‘Thunderbolts’ First Footage Wows Comic Con as Florence Pugh and David Harbour Kick Ass in Marvel’s Villain Team Up

Marvel’s newest team, the Thunderbolts, got its first look at San Diego Comic-Con on Saturday via a tight-lipped cast during the Marvel panel, which nonetheless revealed a few clues.

The entire cast joined the Hall H stage with Marvel Studios chief Kevin Feige, including David Harbour in costume as Red Guardian, who exclaimed, “Oh my god, you guys didn’t dress up? Guys! Guys! I sent that email! We all said we were going to dress up because it was Comic-Con!” before going to change.

While info about the movie was kept to a minumum, some select nuggets included:

*Feige announced that the name wasn’t related to Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross.

*Of her character, Julia Louis-Dreyfus said, “Valentina is after power, control and, I would say, just generally she wants to kick ass in the Marvel universe.”

*Wyatt Russell quipped of his controversial character John Walker, “Everyone is going to fuckin’ love me! It’s really, really, really fun to be with a group of actors that you have a good time with.”

*Sebastian Stan spoke to the emotional journey of his time in the MCU, saying, “It’s like having nine lives. How many are left? I’m so grateful to see everybody here.”

*Harbour got sincere about his love for his “Black Widow” co-star Florence Pugh in this movie, saying, “I want to reiterate what Wyatt said about this group of people. They’re all wonderful, but I do have a favorite. Her name is Florence Pugh. She is just electric to work with. There’s warmth and humor, but there’s also a lot of pathos.”

*Pugh herself shouted out the stunt team on the film, saying, “I think we all like feeling cool doing stunts,” as well as, “This movie is so wonderful and bizarre and it’s very brave and it’s because of this cast.”

After checking in with all the cast, a first clip was played which showcased some of the big stuntwork that was promised during the panel, including a fight scene between Russell’s Walker and Pugh’s Yelena and action footage of the rest of the cast

“Thunderbolts” will release on May 5, 2025, as the last film of Phase Five.

“Thunderbolts” is based on Kurt Busiek’s comic series of the same name. It follows a team of mostly reformed supervillains conducting covert operations on the U.S. government’s behalf. The group is very similar to the DC Universe’s “Suicide Squad,” a team of bad guys working for a shady organization to commute their prison sentences or face grisly deaths. However, Marvel’s version is PG-13 (as opposed to the hard R rating of James Gunn’s 2021 “Suicide Squad”) and is led by Stan’s Winter Soldier, a reformed villain turned fan-favorite hero.

In addition to Stan, the “Thunderbolts” cast includes “Black Widow” cast members Pugh, Harbour and Olga Kurylenko — who play Yelena Belova, Alexei Shostakov/Red Guardian and Taskmaster. Joining them are Hannah John-Kamen (Ghost from “Ant-Man and the Wasp”), Russell (John Walker from “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier”) and Louis-Dreyfus, as mastermind Valentina Allegra de Fontaine. “Top Gun: Maverick” star Lewis Pullman plays the powerful superhero Sentry. Geraldine Viswanathan and Harrison Ford, as Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross from “Captain America: Brave New World,” round out the cast.

Jake Schreier (“Paper Towns,” “Robot and Frank”) is directing the film with a script from “Beef” creator Lee Sung Jin and Joanna Calo.

Watch the trailer here.