The Secret History Behind the Game-Changing Marvel Team Introduced in Thunderbolts

Warning: This article contains full spoilers for Thunderbolts!

All throughout the MCU’s Multiverse Saga, fans have been asking one question: who are the Avengers now? Only now, with the release of Thunderbolts* at the end of Phase 5, do we finally get an answer to that question. It turns out that the Thunderbolts themselves are now the Avengers. Or the New Avengers, to be precise. At least that pesky asterisk is finally making sense.

What does this mean for the MCU leading into The Fantastic Four: First Steps and Avengers: Doomsday? What does it mean to be a New Avenger, exactly, and how does this twist draw upon Marvel’s various New Avengers comics? Here’s what you need to know.

The MCU’s New Avengers Revealed

The Thunderbolts movie ends on a somewhat unexpected note. No sooner do Florence Pugh’s Yelena Belova and her team regroup from their confrontation with Lewis Pullman’s Sentry and prepare to confront Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ Valentina Allegra De Fontaine than they realize they’ve walked right into a PR trap. Valentina stages a press conference where she introduces the befuddled Thunderbolts to the public as “The New Avengers.”

For those keeping score at home, the full New Avengers roster includes:

• Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh)
• Red Guardian (David Harbour)
• Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan)
• The Sentry (Lewis Pullman)
• Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen)
• U.S. Agent (Wyatt Russell)

Basically, everyone who was a Thunderbolt (minus Olga Kurylenko’s Taskmaster, who is killed off early into the film) has now graduated to become a New Avenger. It’s not necessarily the Avengers lineup we would have predicted earlier in the Multiverse Saga, but given how they managed to beat overwhelming odds and save New York City, maybe they’re the team the MCU needs right now.

Of course, it’s already becoming clear that the New Avengers aren’t the only Avengers team on the block. Captain America: Brave New World ends with Anthony Mackie’s Sam Wilson deciding he’s finally ready to step up and spearhead his own team of Avengers. Whether Cap has actually gotten around to forming that team is unclear. But we do know from the post-credits scene in Thunderbolts that he’s none too thrilled at the prospect of another group co-opting the Avengers name.

That scene shows us that the New Avengers have now been active in the MCU for 14 months. They’re currently embroiled in a legal battle with Sam, who apparently owns the actual Avengers trademark. That seems to foreshadow major friction between the New Avengers and Sam’s Avengers in Avengers: Doomsday. But we’ll get to that in a bit. For now, what exactly is a New Avenger, anyway?

What Are the New Avengers?

The concept of the New Avengers was first introduced in Marvel’s 2004 New Avengers comic. That series debuted in the aftermath of a major tragedy in Marvel’s Avengers: Disassembled comic, where a mentally ill Scarlet Witch loses control of her powers and kills several members of her team. The Avengers disband, until one fateful day where they’re called back into action.

The reason Marvel branded this team “New Avengers” is that the roster was quite a bit different from any that had come before. While Captain America, Spider-Woman, and Iron Man represented the old guard, the bulk of the team was made up of characters who would normally never be associated with the Avengers franchise - Spider-Man, Wolverine, Luke Cage, Sentry, and the mysterious Ronin. Not unlike the MCU’s Thunderbolts, these heroes never expected to become Avengers, but they quickly rise to the challenge anyway.

At first, the “New Avengers” term was completely literal. Over time, however, it came to represent a more underground, unsanctioned alternative to the traditional Avengers. Following the events of 2006’s Civil War crossover, the Marvel Universe suddenly has two Avengers teams. Iron Man leads the Mighty Avengers, a S.H.I.E.L.D.-sanctioned team that operates in full support of the Superhuman Registration Act. Meanwhile, the heroes who refuse to support the SHRA, like Spidey, Wolverine, Luke Cage, and Bucky, form another incarnation of the New Avengers. Needless to say, the two teams don’t really get along.

That split only intensifies during Marvel’s 2009 Dark Reign storyline, as Norman Osborn usurps Tony Stark’s position and spearheads his own team of Dark Avengers. The Dark Avengers are notable for featuring many major villains masquerading as heroes. For example, Bullseye becomes Hawkeye, Venom becomes Spider-Man, Daken becomes Wolverine, and so on. The Sentry also sticks around, as he proves sadly all too susceptible to Osborn’s psychological manipulation.

In many ways, the MCU’s New Avengers seem as inspired by the Dark Avengers as they are the New Avengers of the comics. Like the Dark Avengers, Valentina’s New Avengers consists of several characters who are essentially borrowing the costumed identities of past Avengers. Yelena is Black Widow. John Walker is a failed Captain America. Even Red Guardian is essentially a Russian Captain America. Also like the Dark Avengers, Sentry is both a team member and a ticking time bomb looming over their heads. Valentina herself is basically the Norman Osborn figure, right down to the way she manipulates Bob.