The Marvel Cinematic Universe constantly puts out new content for fans, both in theaters and streaming with a Disney+ subscription. One recent movie title is Thunderbolts*, which performed well at the box office upon its release. The movie shockingly killed off Olga Kurylenko's Taskmaster early on, but the actress recently revealed that she originally made it way further into the movie's runtime. Let's break it down.
The Thunderbolts* cast list was full of villains and antiheroes, making it one of the biggest crossovers in recent memory. Fans who spent years watching the Marvel movies in order will remember three of them originated from Black Widow: Yelena, Red Guardian, and Taskmaster. In a translated interview (via ComicBook), Kurylenko spoke about original plans for the blockbuster, offering:
In the first script, my character was there until the end, but it wasn’t the same script at all. After the strike, the script had nothing to do with it. They changed the concept, they changed the story, the places, where it took place. It wasn’t the same anymore. It’s a pity. It was a cool character.
Well, I've got FOMO. Taskmaster was the only member of the team who got killed off throughout Thunderbolts* runtime, and she only got one line of dialogue before Ghost put her down. And now I'm curious about how the character would have functioned in the larger story if she was allowed to stick around. I mean, her history with Yelena alone would be interesting to see played out.
It definitely seems like Olga Kurylenko got the short end of the stick in this equation. On top of her role being reduced to basically a cameo, the rest of the team is already set to return for upcoming Marvel movies. The Thunderbolts aka the New Avengers have already been confirmed in Avengers: Doomsday's cast announcement, so they'll get to crossover with other teams of heroes like the Avengers, X-Men and Fantastic Four. Their collision with the latter team was teased in the Thunderbolts* credits scene, so it seems that everyone but Taskmaster has a bright future in the shared universe.
Fans put together that Taskmaster might be in trouble long before the blockbuster actually hit theaters back in May. She was noticeably missing from most footage from the Thunderbolts* trailers, as well as any group images of the team together. But the fact that she was originally going to be in the whole movie before re-writes happened is definitely a bummer for both the actress and fans of the character.
Thunderbolts* is available to purchased and re-watched digitally now. The next MCU blockbuster hitting theaters is The Fantastic Four: First Steps on July 25th as part of the 2025 movie release list. Unfortunately Taskmaster seemingly won't return to the franchise anytime soon.
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