Two Original Avengers Actors Are in a Movie Together That’s Out Next Week (& You Probably Had No Idea)

The sextet of actors that served as the original line-up in The Avengers have found ways to keep busy outside of the MCU. As for those that left it (or seemingly left it), Scarlett Johansson has been in Fly Me to the Moon, a pair of Wes Anderson movies, and took over the Jurassic franchise for Jurassic World Rebirth. After Hawkeye, Jeremy Renner has continued his role as Mike McLusky on Mayor of Kingstown and appeared in the third Knives Out movie, Wake Up Dead Man. And, while they are returning for Avengers: Doomsday, both Chris Evans and Robert Downey Jr. have worked outside Marvel. Evans has been in Lightyear, The Gray Man, and Red One, amongst other projects, while Downey Jr. won an Oscar for his work in Oppenheimer.

But what about Chris Hemsworth and Mark Ruffalo? They too still work consistently outside their superhero roles. For instance, they will soon appear alongside one another in Crime 101, an adaptation of the novella by The Force and Savages‘ Don Winslow.

What Is Crime 101 About?

Hemsworth plays Mike Davis, a prolific jewel thief who specializes in freeway heists. When an insurance broker (Halle Berry) offers him a chance to take part in his biggest job yet, Davis takes it on, but this pushes him even further towards the sights of the cop who has been chasing him, Det. Lu Lubesnick (Ruffalo).

The title of this Heat-esque movie comes from Davis’ rules for succeeding in his business. Think of them as the rules Jesse Eisenberg’s Columbus tells the audience about how to survive the zombie apocalypse.

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The cast for the film is rounded out by Eternals and The Batman star Barry Keoghan as Ormon, a fellow criminal, Top Gun: Maverick‘s Monica Barbaro as Maya, a woman with whom Davis goes on a date, as well as Straight Outta Compton‘s Corey Hawkins, The Hateful Eight‘s Jennifer Jason Leigh, 48 Hrs.‘s Nick Nolte, and Tate Donovan, who voiced Hercules in the 1997 classic.

This isn’t the first time a Winslow work has been adapted, as The Death and Life of Bobby Z was made into a movie starring Paul Walker, Laurence Fishburne, and Olivia Wilde back in 2007 while the aforementioned Savages captured that film’s sunny California beach tone mixed with the dangers of messing over a cartel. Neither one of those movies was particularly noteworthy, but then again Winslow’s later works are stronger than his earlier stuff, and both of those were earlier books. Crime 101 however, was a part of the excellent collection Broken, which was of the same area as his Cartel trilogy, his Danny Ryan trilogy, and the wonderfully breezy but epic novel The Force (which itself has been long gestating as a potential film).

For those looking for an Avengers team-up, though in a more adversarial context, Crime 101 is your movie. The same goes for those who have long considered themselves fans of Winslow’s prose and have been waiting for that to be properly adapted to the big screen. Neither group has long to wait, as it hits theaters on February 13th.

Are you going to buy a ticket to Crime 101? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!