Marvel’s Thunderbolts Should Reverse 1 The Suicide Squad & Deadpool 2 Trick

Marvel Studios needs to reverse one The Suicide Squad and Deadpool 2 trick when the Thunderbolts movie happens. The Marvel Cinematic Universe has long toyed with the idea of making a movie starring various Marvel villains and anti-heroes. Phase 4 is finally making that a reality after news of Marvel hiring a writer and director for a Thunderbolts movie. Details on the film project are mostly a mystery, but inevitable comparisons to Suicide Squad have quickly popped up regardless.

Warner Bros. and DC Films assembled a group of villains to save the world in 2016 with Suicide Squad, but the comic book versions of Task Force X and Thunderbolts go back way before then. The Thunderbolts have had various forms over the years too, but one of them very much resembles the makeup of the Suicide Squad, where reformed criminals and villains work for the government to go on dangerous missions. Due to the similarity and the unlikelihood of the MCU using the original idea of villains posing as heroes again, Thunderbolts will surely be conscious of avoiding directly copying concepts used in the DC franchise.

In an effort to avoid Suicide Squad comparisons, Marvel should look to reverse one trick that The Suicide Squad and Deadpool 2 used. Both movies included key sequences where superhero/supervillain teams were assembled with D-list comic characters. The trick that The Suicide Squad and Deadpool 2 used, though, was almost immediately killing off these teams. It would be easy for Thunderbolts to copy this trend and include obscure Marvel villains just to kill them. However, it would almost be expected at this point, which is why it would be more surprising to reverse the trend and let a group of lesser villains live on in the MCU.

Several established MCU villains could return to take part in this sequence too. Former Spider-Man foes like Scorpion and Shocker could be part of this government-sponsored villain team, while The Incredible Hulk‘s The Leader and Daredevil‘s Bullseye could also appear. This could even be a chance for obscure villains from the comics who might otherwise not appear, such as Stilt-Man or Wheel Man, to make their MCU debuts. It would, in theory, be straightforward for Thunderbolts to feature them at the start on a mission just to set up the team’s concept – but then also shocking to let them live and simply not be selected for the movie’s primary mission team.

Marvel’s Thunderbolts movie reversing this The Suicide Squad and Deadpool 2 trick would also be an effective way of showing that even less powerful versions of the team can succeed on some level. Without knowing who the Thunderbolts movie villain will be, there is no telling if the real team will fight a major foe like Dr. Doom or someone much less powerful. In any case, seeing a Thunderbolts team that looks like an expendable group of left-field character picks succeed will highlight how much better the movie’s main team will be. And if any of the lesser villains prove to be fan-favorites, they could live on after Thunderbolts, too.