Spoilers below. Five Minute Read

Spontaneously, my husband and I watched Thunderbolts*. We both enjoy Marvel movies (one year, we watched all of them in order), and I like Florence Pugh, so it was an easy decision. We both loved it even though it wasn’t what we expected—it was better.

#1 Power is Bad for Humans

The ‘real’ villain of the story is Valentina, the director of the CIA. The story begins with her sending the Thunderbolts* to kill each other and save her from impeachment and jail time. One of these Thunderbolts* is my fave Florence Pugh, AKA Yelena. The Thunderbolts* quickly figure it out and escape, but Val captures Bob, one of her experiments gone wrong.

Val manipulates Bob, but instead of becoming her puppet, Bob resists, and she loses control over him. So yeah, Val sucks. Her job is about her ego, power and about her constantly manipulating people for her own gain. She is the villain in my eyes (partially) because she has too much power. We all need to have checks and balances. Ways to hold us accountable, because if we don’t, even if we are well-meaning, we can easily become the villain. Ironically, JKR has both written about this extensively and has become it. Dumbledore refuses a job in the Ministry because he understands his own nature. He understands that he cannot handle power and that he makes poor decisions when he has power. Similarly, JKR, once a beloved children’s author, has made it her life’s crusade to go against the most vulnerable group in society again and again.

In short, power is terrible for us. It brings out the worst in us. Val sucks, so does JKR.

#2: Mental Health is Dark

We talk about Mental Health a lot these days, especially on social media, especially to sell us things. But mental health isn’t solved by bubble bath and candles. Mental health is complex and hard. It often takes months, if not years and a lot of different interventions to keep us afloat. Yelena is depressed, we see this in the first line of the movie when she throws herself off a building:

‘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. Or maybe I’m just bored.’

Yelena is joking, but as the story goes on, the viewer can tell without a shadow of a doubt, she is depressed. Yelena tells her dad:

‘Daddy, I’m so alone. I don’t have anything anymore. All I do is sit, and look at my phone, and think of all the terrible things I’ve done; and then I go to work, and then I drink, come home to no-one, then I sit and think of all the terrible things I’ve done again and ag…’

And that is why Yelena bonds so well with Bob, who finds himself with supernatural powers because he signs up for Val’s experiment in Malaysia to escape his own mental health issues. Val sinks her claws into Bob, and then, when he pushes back on her, turns on him immediately. Bob loses it and appears to start killing people all over New York at random. But Bob, or I should say the ‘bad version’ of him is sucking each person into their own depression because that is where he is stuck. Bob is hurting and hurt people hurt people. I don’t say that to dismiss the harm that Bob does, we all need to be held accountable and have consequences for our behaviour, but there is no doubt that poverty, addiction, abuse and poorly managed mental health lead people down dark paths. So yeah bubble baths are not going to do shit.

#3 The Answer is Community

I cannot find the exact quote online, but when Bob is talking to Yelena about his struggles she initially jokes that he just needs to push it down, but at the end of the film she tells him that talking, while it doesn’t fix things, helps, it makes things lighter. Bob tries to save everyone by attacking the ‘bad’ side of himself, but that doesn’t work, it only sucks him in further, he is ‘saved’ by the Thunderbolts* banding around him. Bob is saved by community.

This is the moment of the film that made me tear up. This is the moment that made this my favourite Marvel movie (Black Widow is now second). It is raw and honest and real. As interesting as Thanos was and as badass as the Avengers defeating him was, often the real enemy is ourselves, and the real solution is community. It’s harder, but it’s real.

I have had many seasons in my life when I have felt blue. To be honest, I am in one of those stages right now, but I have only had one season where I couldn’t manage. Where I couldn’t do it. Where the void had me, it had me good. The thing that pulled me out was people, friends, family, and a good therapist. It was hard. In hindsight, I probably should have been on medication, but I got through. And ultimately, that is why this movie meant so much to me. I saw myself in Bob. I saw myself in Yelena (although I am no where near as cool as her) I just wish we all had our own Thunderbolts*.