Recent Marvel films have more to do with multiversal themes, but the upcoming Thunderbolts*, which its director Jake Schreier teases, is more grounded.
During an interview with GamesRadar+, he said, “When [screenwriter] Eric Pearson came up with it with Brian Chapek, I think one of the original versions was kind of like a Die Hard thing.”
“Or it was all going to take place in this vault, and getting out of it, which would have been a very cool thing. So I think in the DNA of the film, it was always a little bit more contained,” he added.
Elsewhere in the interview, the filmmaker said the film went through multiple rewrites. A new idea emerged, and a character named Bob, played by Lewis Pullman, was introduced.
“When I first came in, working with Eric, [it was] finding that idea of having Bob on the team with [the Thunderbolts],” the 43-year-old said.
“In the draft before that, they were on parallel tracks, but it felt like they’ve really got to get to know him if we’re going to make this ending work.”
Then, Jake said that when new writers came on board, they added a more emotional touch to the story, particularly highlighting Yelena’s (Florence Pugh) emotional journey.
He continued, “Later, when [Netflix’s Beef creator] Lee Sung Jin came in, that’s when it really became about a young woman going through a really dark phase.”
“A lot more of the smaller scenes and internal character scenes that express that, and a lot of those kind of metaphysical ideas [came into play], and that’s where it started to feel like, okay, this is really becoming something different.”
“When Joanna [Calo, The Bear co-showrunner] came in and worked on it, and did such a beautiful job, I think a lot of those team dynamics and the way that they play off of each other in the vault, she brought such a great perspective to that,” Jake concluded.
Thunderbolts* will be out on May 2.
