Considered one of my favourite line readings of the 12 months is in Richard Linklater’s Hit Man, when Glen Powell’s character of Gary comes clear to Adria Arjona’s character Madison about how he’s been pretending to be another person. The second is completely deflated by Arjona’s hilariously high-pitched supply of “Who the fuck is GARY?!” It kills each time. I say all of this to say, should you watched the trailer for Marvel’s new film, Thunderbolts*, then you’ll have gotten to the purpose the place Lewis Pullman’s character “Bob” is launched and puzzled, to your self or out loud, “Who the fuck is Bob?!” with the same tenor and tone.
Pricey reader, that’s a superb query. Pullman is enjoying a personality named Robert Reynolds, which suggests he is probably enjoying an MCU model of the Marvel hero often called The Sentry. Initially developed within the late 90s by Paul Jenkins and Rick Veitch earlier than touchdown a mini-series in 2000 from Jenkins with artwork by Jae Lee, the character’s historical past is, even by comedian guide requirements, a bizarrely lengthy and winding highway. The unique collection includes a middle-aged model of Bob remembering that he was as soon as a superhero known as Sentry, who has the facility of 1,000,000 suns that got here from taking a model of the tremendous soldier serum. Afraid that his archfoe “The Void” is returning, Bob seeks out different Marvel heroes to assist him. Over the course of the collection, it’s revealed that Sentry and Void are two sides of the identical coin, manifestations of Bob’s anxiousness and schizophrenia. Mainly, Bob is Marvel’s Superman, if Superman had been additionally Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde.
After all, the Sentry had by no means appeared in a Marvel comedian earlier than the unique Jenkins/Lee miniseries, however there’s a proof as to why he reveals up seemingly out of nowhere; we be taught that with a purpose to shield the world from his darkish aspect, Bob enlisted Dr. Unusual and Mister Implausible of the Implausible 4 to erase the world’s reminiscence of him. That first collection ends with him doing the identical factor once more, for a similar cause. However comedian books being comedian books, it was solely a matter of time earlier than different writers discovered a cause to contain Bob of their tales. Author Brian Michael Bendis ended up utilizing Sentry as a crucial a part of his Mighty Avengers story, the place Tony Stark enlists his assist in trade for looking for a treatment for his psychological points. From there, he turns into a primary fixture throughout Bendis’ Darkish Avengers run, the place Norman Osborn coaxes out The Void to take over Bob and do his bidding.
As a result of Bob’s two personalities are continually jockeying for management, he’s usually too harmful to be left unchecked, which is the aspect that Thunderbolts* appears to be like to be enjoying up. When Yelena (Florence Pugh), John Walker (Wyatt Russell), and others encounter Bob within the trailer, he’s sporting what appears to be like to be a medical robe. Whereas we don’t know at this stage who is precisely pulling the strings, the preliminary implication is that Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ Val has despatched Yelena, Walker, and the opposite anti-heroes of the MCU to both rescue Bob or provoke him in order that he’ll take them out for her. Both manner, one of the vital complicated and complex heroes in current comedian guide reminiscence will take heart stage in a significant Marvel film when Thunderbolts* releases subsequent Might.
