Marvel's Thunderbolts Deserves To Find A Bigger Audience On Home Media

Spoilers for "Thunderbolts" follow.

So it's come to this: I am here to defend a Marvel movie. Look, I don't hate Marvel movies (despite what some may think), but I have proven to be mostly immune to their charms. I like some of them (hell, I even liked "Eternals"!), but I also agree with the assessment that we've been oversaturated with superhero movies for the last decade, and I wouldn't mind if the subgenre took a break for a bit. And yet ... I feel kind of bad about what happened to Marvel's "Thunderbolts."

To be clear, this 2025 film wasn't some gigantic flop, but since these movies are so damn expensive, the $382.4 million box off haul was considered a "disappointment" (side-note: if someone wants to give me a "disappointing" $382.4 million, I will happily accept it). The less-than-desirable intake of "Thunderbolts" isn't exactly a huge shock at this point, as we seem to have entered an era where the once-mighty MCU can't draw crowds like it used to. There was a time when it seemed like Marvel movies were too big to fail, but audiences have grow a little weary.

But here's the thing: "Thunderbolts" deserved better. Because while I just got done saying that these movies don't exactly wow me, I was quite taken with Jake Schreier's flick, which is ultimately about emotionally broken people literally battling depression. You don't really see that in superhero blockbusters. Now that "Thunderbolts" is available on 4K (and headed to Disney+ later this month), I hope a bigger audience gives it a shot.

Before we go any further, I want to be clear: I'm not saying "Thunderbolts" is some misunderstood masterpiece. The movie's basic set-up — a rag-tag group of misfits who have to learn to become a team! — certainly isn't doing anything fresh and new. And yet, "Thunderbolts" works because the characters, a group of B-players from other Marvel films, are easy to like, flaws and all. 

Florence Pugh is a great actor, and she's giving it her all here as Yelena Belova, Black Widow's sister who is painfully alone and full of all sorts of self-loathing and regret. With a little help from her father (David Harbour), failed Captain America replacement John Walker (Wyatt Russell), the molecularly unstable Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), and of course, good old Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan), who is a Congressman now (?), Yelena gets roped into a mission set-up by CIA head/Tulsi Gabbard clone Valentina Allegra de Fontaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), who is really trying to kill all these people off.

The mission involves Bob (Lewis Pullman), who is seemingly one of the most super-powered beings in the entire MCU, but who also has to deal with his own emotional baggage and mental illness. 

"Thunderbolts" breezes through its runtime and hammers home the fact that all of these characters are damaged in some way, but that doesn't mean they're beyond hope. As someone who has grappled with clinical depression for the majority of his life, I found the way "Thunderbolts" approached inherent sadness and loneliness kind of refreshing.

I was particularly taken with the film's big climax, where Bob turns into a kind of physical manifestation of depression, and the Thunderbolts have to gather together in a big group hug to save the day (it's also interesting that another recent Disney film, "Inside Out 2," has almost the same climatic group hug solution).

So if you skipped "Thunderbolts" in theaters and have been waiting to check it out at home, now's your chance. Take it from me, someone who doesn't love these movies: this is a good one, and deserved better.

Marvel Studios