Who Are the Thunderbolts* in the MCU? Explaining the Marvel Team

Careful who you assemble. “There are good guys, and you’re bad guys,” CIA Director Val (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) tells the team of misfits in Marvel Studios Thunderbolts*. “But there are worse guys.” Disney’s D23 Brazil revealed a special look at the next MCU movie after Captain America: Brave New World, and introduced the Thunderbolts* (asterisk included): Yelena Belova/Black Widow (Florence Pugh), Bucky Barnes/the Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan), Alexei Shostakov/Red Guardian (David Harbour), John Walker/U.S. Agent (Wyatt Russell), Antonia Dreykov/Taskmaster (Olga Kurylenko), Ava Starr/Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), and Bob Reynolds/Sentry (Lewis Pullman).

“Everyone here has done bad things: shadow ops, robbing government labs, contract kills,” Yelena says of the team of assassins, anti-heroes, and reformed supervillains. “So someone wants us gone.”

The Thunderbolts in the Comics: Justice, Like Lightning…

RELATED: Marvel’s Thunderbolts Comics Featuring Black Widow and Winter Soldier Strike in 2025

In the comics, the Thunderbolts were formed by Baron Helmut Zemo as an incarnation of the Masters of Evil in the absence of the Avengers. Secretly a team of supervillains posing as superheroes, the original Thunderbolts lineup — Citizen V (Zemo), Techno (Fixer), Atlas (Goliath), MACH-1 (Beetle), Meteorite (Moonstone), Screaming Mimi (Songbird), and Jolt — eventually embraced true heroism and sought redemption, turning on Zemo when the villain revealed his true motives.

When the Thunderbolts roster became outlaws, they were joined by reformed criminal-turned-Avenger Clint Barton/Hawkeye, and in the years since, the various iterations of the team have been led by heroes and villains alike. Bucky, Yelena, and Luke Cage have all led the more heroic versions of the Thunderbolts, while villains like Norman Osborn, a.k.a. the Green Goblin, and Wilson Fisk, the Kingpin, have established Thunderbolts teams to carry out their dark reigns over the Marvel Universe. Even General “Thunderbolt” Ross, A.K.A. the Red Hulk, has led an ultra-lethal Thunderbolts team consisting of Venom, Elektra, the Punisher, and Deadpool.

Most recently, Mayor Cage reformed the Thunderbolts with Hawkeye leading a team that includes Monica Rambeau/Photon, America Chavez, and the new Power Man.

Who Are the MCU Thunderbolts*?

Yelena Belova: Black Widow

A former Red Room assassin and undercover operative who was trained to kill alongside her adoptive sister — the Avenger Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) — Yelena and Natasha were raised by Alexei and Melina Vostokoff (Rachel Weisz). After the family of four reunited to thwart the Soviet General Dreykov (Ray Winstone) and wake the Black Widows brainwashed by the Red Room Academy in 2021’s Black Widow (set between the events of Captain America: Civil War and Avengers: Infinity War), Yelena died when Thanos (Josh Brolin) erased half of the population in the universe with a snap of his fingers.

Yelena was blipped back to life five years later and learned that Natasha died (during the events of Avengers: Endgame). In Black Widow‘s post-credits scene, Val assigned Yelena her next target: the man she believed was responsible for her sister’s death, Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner).

When she sought her revenge in 2021’s Hawkeye series, Yelena learned she was hired by Bishop Security CEO Eleanor Bishop (Vera Farmiga) to assassinate Barton on behalf of the Kingpin, Wilson Fisk (Vincent D’Onofrio). Yelena tried to kill Barton, but when he convinced her that sister sacrificed herself and died saving the world, she mourned Natasha and then let go of her vendetta against the still-grieving Hawkeye.

Appearances: Black Widow (2021), Hawkeye (2021), Thunderbolts* (2025)

James “Bucky” Barnes: The Winter Soldier

A sergeant in the United States Army, Bucky Barnes served alongside Steve Rogers (Chris Evans), the first Captain America, in World War II. Once thought KIA behind enemy lines (in 2011’s Captain America: The First Avenger), Barnes was captured by HYDRA and injected with the Super Soldier Serum. For the next five decades, a mind-wiped and brainwashed Barnes operated as the HYDRA assassin known as the Winter Soldier.

After Rogers and his allies, Natasha Romanoff and the Falcon (Anthony Mackie), learned that HYDRA had infiltrated S.H.I.E.L.D., they foiled Secretary Alexander Pierce’s (Robert Redford) plot to enact Project Insight (in 2014’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier) and murder 20 million people targeted by HYDRA. Rogers was able to stir Barnes’ memories, but a fugitive Barnes was framed for the bombing that killed Wakandan King T’Chaka (John Kani) in 2016’s Captain America: Civil War. After the culprit was revealed to be the Sokovian terrorist Baron Zemo (Daniel Brühl) and brought to justice by the Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman), Wakanda was able to remove the Winter Soldier programming from Barnes’ mind.

Barnes was snapped after the Battle of Wakanda (in Infinity War) and returned during the Battle of Earth (in Endgame). He received a pardon from the government and was making amends for his past as the Winter Soldier when Sam Wilson — who has chosen by Rogers to be the new Captain America — relinquished the star-spangled shield.

When the United States Department of Defense selected Army Captain John Walker as its government-backed Cap, Barnes and Wilson learned that a mysterious Power Broker was funding the recreation of the Super Soldier Serum that turned a since-retired Steve Rogers into Captain America in the 1940s. Barnes and Wilson reluctantly joined forces with Zemo to prevent the creation of more super soldiers like the increasingly reckless Walker Cap (in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier).

The last we saw him, Barnes helped Captain America (Wilson) and the disgraced U.S. Agent (Walker) battle the Flag Smashers when the anti-nationalist group planned to carry out a terrorist attack against the Global Repatriation Council in the aftermath of the Blip.

Appearances: Captain America: The First Avenger (2011), Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), Ant-Man (2015), Captain America: Civil War (2016), Black Panther (2018), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Avengers: Endgame (2019), Falcon and the Winter Soldier (2021), Thunderbolts* (2025)

Alexei Shostakov: Red Guardian

Russia’s answer to Captain America, Alexei Shostakov was the Soviet Union’s first and only super soldier. In the 1990s, Dreykov assigned Alexei and Melina Vostokoff to pose as a family with a young Natasha and Yelena as part of a plot to infiltrate the North Institute in Ohio, where HYDRA was secretly developing the Winter Soldier project.

After the Russian sleeper agents were eventually discovered by S.H.I.E.L.D. and forced to flee America, Dreykov sent Natasha and Yelena to train at the Red Room and had Alexei jailed at the Seventh Circle Prison in Russia. 21 years later, in 2016, Natasha and Yelena broke their adoptive father out of prison, and together, they tracked down Melina in Saint Petersburg, Russia. There Alexei reclaimed his Red Guardian uniform and later fought the Taskmaster — Dreykov’s daughter — when the four reunited to take down the Red Room for good. Alexei and Melina were last seen parting ways with Natasha on their mission to create more Red Dust, the synthetic gas capable of countering the chemical subjugation of the Black Widows.

Appearances: Black Widow (2021), Thunderbolts* (2025)

John Walker: U.S. Agent

A former Captain of the U.S. Army Rangers who earned three Medals of Honor for his tours in Afghanistan, Walker was named the new Captain America in 2024. Wielding the shield that Sam Wilson handed over to the Smithsonian, the government-approved Cap
was joined in the field by his longtime friend, Army Sergeant Major Lemar Hoskins (Clè Bennett), as Captain America’s partner, Battlestar.

Walker used the last of the recreated Super Soldier Serum to become enhanced after being defeated during a fight with Wakanda’s Dora Milaje. After Hoskins was KIA during a fight with Karli Morgenthau (Erin Kellyman) and the Flag Smashers, Walker used the shield of Captain America to violently execute a Flag Smasher, sparking an international incident.

Stripped of his title and authority as Captain America, the disgraced Cap was given an other than honorable discharge. He was quickly intercepted by Val, who told him he was “very valuable to certain people,” and Walker melted down his medals to create a replica of Captain America’s shield. The vigilante Walker helped the Winter Soldier and the new Captain America defeat the Flag Smashers, then reported to Val for his next mission in a black costume. “Things are about to get weird. So when they do, we’re not gonna need a Captain America,” Val told him. “We’re gonna need a U.S. Agent.”

Appearances: The Falcon and the Winter Soldier (2021), Thunderbolts* (2025)

Antonia Dreykov: Taskmaster

In 2008, Dreykov’s daughter was nearly killed by the bomb intended to assassinate her father during the Budapest Operation carried out by Clint Barton and Natasha Romanoff in her defection to S.H.I.E.L.D. Dreykov implanted a controlling chip in Antonia’s neck and raised the girl in the Red Room following her disfigurement. A perfect mimic, she became the masked assassin Taskmaster: the Red Room’s deadliest killer.

Antonia’s photographic reflexes mean she’s able to match the fighting styles of Black Widow, Hawkeye, Captain America, Black Panther, and Spider-Man, which she utilizes alongside weapons like shields, knives, guns, and swords. In 2016, Taskmaster tried to kill Romanoff in revenge, but she was freed from her father’s control with the Red Dust. After learning her father died during Romanoff and Belova’s attack on the Red Doom, Antonia left with the other Black Widows.

Appearances: Black Widow (2021), Thunderbolts* (2025)

Ava Starr: Ghost

The daughter of a former S.H.I.E.L.D. scientist who researched the Quantum Realm with Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and Bill Foster (Laurence Fishburne), young Ava Starr was left intangible from the fatal accident quantum experiment caused by Elihas Starr (Michael Cerveris). The accident gave Ava the powers of invisibility and quantum phase-shifting, or the power to shift between quantum dimensions and pass through objects.

S.H.I.E.L.D. built Ava a containment suit to help control her painful phasing and trained her to be a stealth operative, codenamed Ghost. “They weaponized me,” she told Ant-Man (Paul Rudd) and Wasp (Evangeline Lilly) in 2018’s Ant-Man and the Wasp. “I stole for them. Spied for them. Killed for them. And in exchange for my soul, they were going to cure me. They lied.”

After the fall of S.H.I.E.L.D. in 2014, she sought out Foster’s help to cure her condition using the Quantum Energy Chamber he built to manage her molecular disequilibrium. Ava planned to intercept Pym’s Quantum Tunnel and drain Janet van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer) of the healing quantum energy she had absorbed during the decades she was lost in the Quantum Realm, but when the original Wasp returned, Janet used her powers to stabilize Ava and let her become tangible — saving her life. Ava then escaped with Foster.

Ghost’s DNA was among the superhuman DNA secretly harvested by Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) and used by the shape-shifting Skrulls to create the super-powered Super-Skrull in 2023’s Secret Invasion. The Skrulls G’iah (Emilia Clarke) and Gravik (Kingsley Ben-Adir) were seen using Ghost’s phase-shifting and invisibility powers.

Appearances: Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018), Thunderbolts* (2025)

Bob Reynolds: The Sentry

RELATED: Who Is Bob in Thunderbolts*? Marvel’s Sentry, Explained

Robert “Bob” Reynolds encounters Yelena, U.S. Agent, and Ghost in what appears to be the basement of the now Val-owned Avengers Tower. Little is known about the patient gown-clad Bob, but in the comics, he is the solar-powered superhero Sentry — the alter-ego of his true persona, the malevolent entity known as the Void. A product of “Project Sentry” — an attempt to recreate the super-soldier serum that transformed Steve Rogers into Captain America — Bob was a diagnosed schizophrenic with generalized anxiety disorder and agoraphobia who stole the Sentry serum to get high. He later joined Norman Osborn’s Thunderbolts when the then-H.A.M.M.E.R. Director formed the Dark Avengers.

Appearances: Thunderbolts* (2025)

The official synopsis: “Marvel Studios and a crew of indie veterans who sold out present Thunderbolts*, an irreverent team-up featuring depressed assassin Yelena Belova (Pugh) alongside the MCU’s least anticipated band of misfits.”

Produced by Kevin Feige (Deadpool & Wolverine), Jake Schreier (Paper Towns, Beef, Star Wars: Skeleton Crew) directs from a script by Eric Pearson (Thor: Ragnarok, Black Widow, The Fantastic Four: First Steps), Joanna Calo (The Bear), and Lee Sung Jin (It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Beef).

Marvel Studios’ Thunderbolts* strikes theaters on May 2, 2025, as part of Phase Five of the MCU.