A recent podcast appearance from Justin Kroll has revealed that Yelena Belova (played by Florence Pugh) is set to lead the Thunderbolts in the upcoming Marvel Studios film. Here’s what Kroll had to say on Matthew Belloni’s Podcast:

[Pugh] has got the Marvel superhero that’s already got a spin-off. Upcoming for her, actually, on that character is this Thunderbolts film, which is basically Marvel’s Suicide Squad. Hopefully, it has better results. But the concept is it’d be her leading the team of like Wyatt Russell’s [John Walker], Daniel Bruhl’s [Zemo], those anti-heroes that aren’t exactly good but aren’t exactly bad. So there’s that. And people seem to like the Yelena character.

Justin Kroll

We learned at San Diego Comic-Con 2022 that Thunderbolts would close out Phase 5 of the MCU, which kicks off in February 2023 with the release of Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.

In the comics, the Thunderbolts have comprised of Baron Zemo, U.S. Agent, The Winter Soldier, Yelena Belova, Ghost, Taskmaster, and Abomination. All of those characters have appeared in one way or another in the most recent phase of Marvel’s programming with Disney+ shows and movies.

It was also recently confirmed that Jake Schreier would direct the film. If you don’t know anything about the Thunderbolts, consider them like the Marvel version of DC’s Suicide Squad. They’re a group of villains, or characters who were villains at one point, that have to work together for General Thaddeus E. “Thunderbolt” Ross. With William Hurt‘s untimely passing in May, that role might need to be recast or changed to a different character. Marvel might’ve been planting seeds for this with Valentina Allegra de Fontaine creating a team.

We’ll have to see how this works when Thunderbolts starts filming sometime next summer and releases in theaters on July 26th, 2024.

For more on Marvel, make sure to check back to That Hashtag Show.

Source: The Town Podcast

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