The actor Wyatt Russell spoke in a Q&A about the upcoming Marvel project Thunderbolts, which conceptually resembles DC’s Suicide Squad. According to the actor, the film is set to bring a breath of fresh air to the MCU around the supervillains.
Why is there currently a crisis in the MCU? Marvel is facing several issues at the moment:
- With Avengers Endgame in 2019, an era came to an end, and the stories of many beloved heroes such as Iron Man and Captain America reached their conclusion; new faces have struggled to connect with their popularity.
- Nowadays, there are numerous competitors that Marvel must contend with: Whether it’s DC or Netflix productions like The Umbrella Academy – the supply of superhero productions is immense.
- The Marvel films are part of a vast multiverse. Thus, viewers often have to watch X other projects to truly understand all the connections – this is off-putting.
- Marvel planned Kang as the major antagonist for the upcoming phase, however, there are serious allegations of domestic violence against the actor Jonathan Majors.
- Marvel recently experienced some major flops, like The Eternals or most recently The Marvels, which even had the worst box office opening in MCU history.
All of this leads to Marvel currently being unable to connect with the success and popularity of the past. New ideas to revive the franchise are needed.
A new film is supposed to change quite a bit according to Wyatt Russell, who played the role of John Walker in the Marvel series The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, and bring some momentum back to the MCU.
With The Marvels, the last MCU production flopped massively in theaters:
“It’s time to make a good Marvel film”
What did Wyatt Russell say about Thunderbolts? In a Q&A in New York, the actor was asked about the upcoming Marvel film Thunderbolts.
This will revolve around a group of supervillains, similar to DC’s Suicide Squad, who must carry out a secret mission on behalf of the government. Involved are Wyatt Russell as John Walker, Sebastian Stan as Bucky Barnes, Florence Pugh as Yelena Belova, and David Harbour in the role of Red Guardian.
Wyatt Russell is optimistic that the new film will be good. “I know that everyone has jumped on this Marvel train right now because things aren’t going so well,” he admitted. However, he trusts director Jake Schreier to create something exciting and new.
Although Wyatt Russell does not know the complete story, he knows how the narrative should be structured. Even though he can’t go into detail about it, Thunderbolts is supposed to do quite a bit differently than previous Marvel productions:
But it’s not a straightforward Marvel film, like you’ve seen in the past. I think it’s going to be a lot of fun, but I think it’s going to be something that hopefully Marvel fans will look at and say: ‘Oh, okay, that’s a bit different, let’s get serious about this.’
And as far as our approach goes, it’s time to get a little to work, it’s time to make a good Marvel film, so let’s do that and work hard and not take things for granted.
Wyatt Russell, source: The Hollywood Reporter
Here our colleagues from Moviepilot explain in detail why The Marvels was such a huge failure at the box office: Entertaining MCU blockbuster faces setback: The failure of The Marvels explained
When does Thunderbolts release? The release of the new Marvel film is scheduled for July 25, 2025.
James Gunn also spoke in a podcast about the biggest problem that superhero productions face today.
In his opinion, the problem is not that there are too many superhero films and series, but something else:
