Thunderbolts Is Cinema | The First Artistic MCU Film

There are people who complain Marvel movies aren’t artistic. Of course, there are others who scream back that Marvel movies don’t have to be artistic because the point isn’t art, the point is entertainment, so don’t hold the movie to the standards of an art film, just learn how to enjoy something for what it is and be entertained for a second, damn. 

Here’s the thing. It’s not hard to be artistic. There are very, very, very basic things a movie can do to be “artsy” without losing any of the popcorn-flick entertainment value. That’s why a legendary filmmaker like Martin Scorsese gets so exasperated by the MCU, to the point of saying “I don’t think they’re cinema.” 

Thunderbolts is a perfect example of how incredibly easy it is to go from “empty, shallow, soulless cash grab” to “oh, hey, that was coherent and thoughtful.” 

There’s one scene in particular that will, hopefully, make you realize just how low-effort most Marvel movies have been. 

The One Scene In Thunderbolts That Redeems The MCU

The scene in question starts less than two minutes into the movie. Yelenia jumps off the really tall building, parachutes onto another, then opens one door and we cut to her entering a hallway full of guards. She fights her way through the hallway. 

Every MCU movie has a fight. So this is nothing new. Many of them have hallway fights. Ever since Oldboy, hallway fights are a whole  thing, like the Akira Slide. There are “best hallway fight” lists and even  “best hallway fights in the MCU” lists. 

What’s different about the hallway fight in Thunderbolts is that it does that thing called “art”. Shocking, I know.

How, though? 

The entire time Yelena’s jumping, parachuting, and fighting, there’s a voiceover from Yelena. Quote: There’s something wrong with me. An emptiness. I thought it started when my sister died, but now it feels like something bigger. Just a…void [jumps off building]. [parachute deploys] Or maybe I’m just bored. They sent me a job—I clock in, clock out, you know? [hallway fight starts]  I’m in the cleanup business. This week Malaysia, next week who knows? I thought throwing myself into work was the  answer. But I’m not focused and I’m not happy and I don’t have purpose and without purpose I’m just drifting like a river. [hallway fight ends] Or like an old leaf. Or an old leaf in a river. Which do you think is better?

Yelena is describing, without ever saying the word,  depression. A darkness that has settled upon her mind, body, and soul. When it comes to the hallway fight, Jake Schreier filmed it to reflect Yelena’s state of mind. The only source of light comes from the open door at the end of the hall. That means the room is mostly filled with darkness. We see Yelena essentially fighting shades. Schreier positions the camera above the action, looking down, so we see the long shadows cast by Yelena and each of her opponents. Where people have dimensionality, shadows are flat and vacant. Which is essentially what depression is. It flips the light and depth of life into something dark and trivial.

There’s a version of the hallway fight that focuses on the cool factor of each punch and parry, which is exactly what you get in something like the Netflix/D+ Daredevil show. And there’s nothing wrong with that. There’s an artistry to that choreography and presentation. But it’s not “artistic” in the sense of having meaning beyond entertainment or plot. 

Many people associate artistry in cinema with slower, more existential, humanistic films where nothing much happens except for drama and melodrama that the pretentious claim has deep meaning. Think Citizen Kane, The Brutalist, Chungking Express, Breathless, There Will Be Blood. Another perception of artistry in cinema is the hard-to-understand weirdness of The Lobster, The Holy Mountain, Stalker, Beau is Afraid, etc., etc. Sometimes you get the mainstream balance that you see in Black Swan, Whiplash, The Shining, and Fight Club. 

Overall, there’s a noticeable difference in the energy, rhythm, and texture between an “artistic” movie and blockbuster. It’s easy to believe there’s a great divide between the two. But there’s not. What often happens is that the  artistic picture focuses too much on form (style)  and forgets function (plot). While the popcorn flick abandons form to emphasize function. All the Thunderbolts scene did is combine form and function in a very basic way. It’s not brain surgery or rocket science. An MCU movie doesn’t have to be Citizen Kane to be artistic. It’s not hard to go, “The character is depressed, so let’s reflect that in the visuals.” 

What’s nice is that Thunderbolts goes a step further and has the shadows foreshadow the power of Void when Void takes over Sentry. When Void blasts someone into oblivion, they literally go from being a person to a shadow on the ground. 

No one’s saying every movie has to be Oscar bait. But the response to the Thunderbolts (the most positive the MCU has received in the 6 years since Endgame) shows how incorporating basic artistic gestures—which are nothing more than a demonstration that the filmmaker understands the tenets of cinema as a visual medium and  how to use the vocabulary of the medium to convey the story through more than exposition—goes a long way to immersing audiences and elevating the viewing experience. 

This idea of having formal aspects of the film reflect the theme comes through in the title, too. Thunderbolts is about emotional duality. Yelena evolves from an isolated depressive to the leader of a found family that gives her strength. She goes from a place of darkness to a place of brightness. So the title changing from Thunderbolts to New Avengers is another one of those very simple but very effective choices that combines form and function. 

Yelena Is An Old Leaf In A River

One of the most interesting things about Thunderbolts is that it can never just be artistic. Every time it does something “high brow” it has to undercut it with humor, almost like it’s afraid that general audiences will feel betrayed by being asked to think. For example, everything Yelena says through the end of the hallway fight is very poignant. And it crescendos with a really honest declaration:  I’m not focused and I’m not happy and I don’t have purpose and without purpose I’m just drifting like a river. 

Except the metaphor feels weird, right? Drifting like a river? Yelena is aware of the poor quality of the metaphor. Which is why she immediately follows up with “Or like an old leaf.” That feels even worse than the first metaphor. Of course, the rule of three states we have to have another bad metaphor, which Yelena delivers. “Or an old leaf in a river.” Suddenly, the heaviness of the moment lightens. And we’ve cut from the hallway to Yelena in a bright room and what follows is the more standard Marvel banter and action sequence. 

Over and over again, Thunderbolts cracks a comedic beat to undercut any and all moments of artistic and emotional depth. I’m torn about that. Because there’s an argument that it fits the duality of struggling with depression where you bounce back and forth from normalcy to downtrodden. Bob reflects this duality. One minute he’s The Sentry, this golden god. Next, he’s Void, an umbrance who would eradicate everything. Going from heavier beats to lighter ones  embodies that duality.

But it also kind of feels like Marvel was scared that anyone in the audience might say, “Hey, why are you making me think about emotions and stuff? I want the clown to make me laugh, not make me think. Make me laugh, clown! Now!” By that, I mean it felt like Marvel was afraid to embrace such seriousness and didn’t trust that its audience would let them tell the story without including as many mental and emotional breaks as possible without compromising the theme. Imagine if the same thing happened in Matt Reeves’s Batman. Batman would be like, “I am vengeance” and beat down a street thug, only for the film to suddenly cut to Bruce Wayne filming  a TikTok where he does some silly dance. Matt Reeves didn’t do that because Matt Reeves makes “cinema”. And audiences loved The Batman because it treated them and the film with respect. 

Despite Marvel’s lack of comfort with art, Thunderbolts is a huge step forward. I don’t think any MCU film has had the leeway to be this meaningful with its visuals. There are previous films that had thoughtful, poignant  narrative meaning—like Black Panther and Black Widow—but lacked the visual artistry in support of the themes. 

History tells us that Thunderbolts is a fluke in the MCU. A one-off where a bit of artistry slipped through the cracks because the story of Sentry and the Void is so obvious in its themes that you have to reflect that in the film itself. In other words, the broken clock that is the MCU finally got the time right. 

But, maybe, just maybe, Thunderbolts marks a shift. Maybe the people at Marvel Studios have been humbled by their string of flops and bad reviews and finally realized that audiences aren’t stupid and actually care about quality. Crazy concept, I know. Instead of making more Thor Love and Thunders that  insult everyone’s intelligence, it’s possible Marvel makes more Thunderbolts that respect the characters, story, concepts, and audience. One can only hope. 

The Meaning of Thunderbolts

Just in case anyone needed it spelled out. The meaning of Thunderbolts is Yelena’s struggle with depression. Bob is an external representation of what’s going on inside of her. Movies need these physical representations of emotions or concepts because it lacks the interiority of a novel. A story where a character sits there and talks about how sad they are isn’t as exciting as one where the  character fights a manifestation of their sadness. 

The other Thunderbolt members are like Yelena in that they’re haunted by some sort of trauma and baggage. They’re all good people who have gone down the wrong path and found themselves tired of clawing to get back to the light. Each has slowly let the darkness consume them.

The story boils this down to loneliness and isolation. When people are isolated, they spiral. It’s when they come together and start the burden eases, because others always seem to see more in us than we see in ourselves. And when we trust them, it reshapes our own perception of self. Slowly, we see ourselves more through their eyes than our own. Which is why we get that big scene where everyone fights to go to Bob and hug him and stop him from fighting himself. By giving that compassion to someone else who is at rock bottom, they give it to themselves as well. Breakthrough occurs.