Have Jodie Turner-Smith & Nathalie Emmanuel Joined The MCU? Speculation Mounts After THUNDERBOLTS* Premiere

Have Jodie Turner-Smith & Nathalie Emmanuel Joined The MCU? Speculation Mounts After THUNDERBOLTS* Premiere

Jodie Turner-Smith and Nathalie Emmanuel both attended last night's Thunderbolts* premiere, leading to speculation that they may have joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe...

By MarkCassidy - Apr 23, 2025 02:04 PM EST
Filed Under: Thunderbolts

Marvel Studios held the world premiere of Thunderbolts* in London last night, and the stars of the latest MCU movie were in attendance - along with a few familiar faces who aren't in the movie (at least, as far as we know).

Pedro Pascal (The Fantastic Four: First Steps) and Simu Liu (Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings) walked the red carpet, along with Jodie Turner-Smith (The Acolyte, Bad Monkey) and Nathalie Emmanuel (Game of Thrones, The Killer).

This wouldn't be the first time someone attended the premiere of a movie they didn't appear in, of course, but we have seen actors show up to Marvel Studios screenings in the past who would later be confirmed as cast members in upcoming projects. The fact that Turner-Smith and Emmanuel were the only non-MCU actors on the Thunderbolts* red carpet has led to speculation that they may have joined (or are in talks to join) the franchise in undisclosed roles.

It might be a stretch, but it's worth mentioning that Turner-Smith and Emmanuel are both popular fan-picks to play Storm in the MCU X-Men reboot.

Do you think there's anything to this, or did these actresses simply attend the premiere to check out the movie? Drop us a comment down below.

We recently got confirmation that the next MCU movie has a fairly standard runtime of 2 hours, 6 minutes, and updated box office estimates predict that Thunderbolts* will take in between $63 million - $77 million domestically over the course of its opening weekend.

This wouldn't be a bad result for a movie with a (relatively) modest budget of $180M (minus additional costs), especially when you take into account that Thunderbolts* is a fairly obscure property without any major A-list stars (Florence Pugh and Sebastian Stan are by far the biggest names).

The main cast of the movie (minus Olga Kurylenko) were confirmed to return for Avengers: Doomsday during Marvel's recent live-stream.

Marvel Studios recently announced the exciting news that Son Lux will be scoring Thunderbolts*. The three-member, American experimental band was Oscar and BAFTA- nominated for their score for 2022’s best picture, Everything Everywhere All at Once. 

In Thunderbolts*, Marvel Studios assembles an unconventional team of antiheroes — Yelena Belova, Bucky Barnes, Red Guardian, Ghost, Taskmaster and John Walker. After finding themselves ensnared in a death trap set by Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, these disillusioned castoffs must embark on a dangerous mission that will force them to confront the darkest corners of their pasts. Will this dysfunctional group tear themselves apart, or find redemption and unite as something much more before it’s too late?

Returning to their Marvel Cinematic Universe roles are Florence Pugh, Sebastian Stan, David Harbour, Wyatt Russell, Olga Kurylenko, Hannah John-Kamen and Julia Louis-Dreyfus. The cast also includes newcomers to the MCU—Lewis Pullman, Geraldine Viswanathan, Chris Bauer and Wendell Edward Pierce.

Jake Schreier directs Thunderbolts* with Kevin Feige producing. Louis D’Esposito, Brian Chapek and Jason Tamez serve as executive producers.

Marvel Studios’ Thunderbolts* opens in U.S. theaters on May 2, 2025.

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MyCoolYoung
MyCoolYoung - 4/23/2025, 2:04 PM
Usually where there’s smoke there’s fire I’d say.

Why don’t we do premier threads anymore?
loemination
loemination - 4/23/2025, 2:10 PM
I hope they dont pick jodie as Storm. The best pick is Damaris Lewis!!! She played in DC's TITANS serie.
abd00bie
abd00bie - 4/23/2025, 7:37 PM
@loemination - Any full black actress would be a good direction start, Storm is not bi-racial like Halle Berry and Alexandra Shipp, neither had a commanding presence. I say cast an unknown mid 30s to early 40s
spr0cks
spr0cks - 4/23/2025, 2:14 PM
RE : >>>"It might be a stretch, but it's worth mentioning that Turner-Smith and Emmanuel are both popular fan-picks to play Storm in the MCU X-Men reboot."

Turner-Smith I could see it (although she seems too old for what Marvel might be going for with a reboot of the X-Men - especially if Sadie Sink is a leading contender to play Jean Gray), but that's a firm NO for me fwith Natalie Emmanuel.

I love the actress, but I think she'd be totally wrong and completely miscast as storm, as you'd just be repeating the errors in the previous castings of Halle Berry and Alexandra Shipp.

Storm is Half-Kenyan and half-(dark-skinned)African-American.
Do these people know what Kenyans look like?
Whoever they end up casting as Storm should be closer in skin tone complexion to Lupita Nyong'o or Edi Gathegi (Mr. Terrific in Superman : Legacy) than to Beyonce or Halle Berry.

Of the two actors named above obviously Turner-Smith is the one who fits closer to that archetype, but then if you don't care about the age and are going for that age range then why not just go and cast Lupita and be done with it?
Academy Award winner and ACTUAL Kenyan.
Yes, she already has another role in the MCU, but if RDJ can be both Tony Stark and Victor Von Doom (Through whatever multi-dimensional math and shennanigans) then don't tell me you wouldn't be able to work this out either.

It's a pity that the actors who would have been perfect to play Storm are all already cast in the MCU as other characters and as Wakandans.
Aside from Lupita the other leading contenders would have been Florence Kasumba (a nextdoor neighbor to Lupita, as a Ugandan) and Danai Gurira (Okoye) and both of whom are Dora Milaj.

You see how they cast for Black Panther and Wakandans (ad East African country)?

Do that.
Stick to that template.
MakeAmericaGrea
MakeAmericaGrea - 4/23/2025, 2:22 PM
Yyyyyaaassssss

Yyyyaaaaaassssssss
TheVisionary25
TheVisionary25 - 4/23/2025, 2:24 PM
I could see them having joined as a possibility so we’ll see…

Jodie Turner Smith as Storm.

User Comment Image

Both her and Nathalie Emmanuel would be a good addition to the MCU!!.
AllsNotGood
AllsNotGood - 4/23/2025, 3:31 PM
Magneta and professor xx
WelcomeBackFrank
WelcomeBackFrank - 4/23/2025, 4:07 PM
After her rap temper tantrum over people not liking “The Acolyte”, I’d say nerddom is tired and over Nathalie Emanuel as we are Rachel Zegler. But I am sure Disney will find a way to use and protect both and Pedro Pascal will go out his way to simp for them.
videovac
videovac - 4/23/2025, 7:15 PM
"After her rap temper tantrum over people not liking “The Acolyte”, I’d say nerddom is tired and over Nathalie Emanuel" - @WelcomeBackFrank
I know all black people look alike, but you're thinking of Amandla Stenberg, not Emmanuel, Nathalie.
Once again, Amandla Stenberg, not Nathalie Emmanuel, not Ella Balinska, Amandla "Acolyte" f_cking Stenberg.
I thought "nerds" were supposed to be smart. Nerds would know who they're criticizing. A shame there are no edit features. This site's only almost 20 years old.
WelcomeBackFrank
WelcomeBackFrank - 4/24/2025, 7:24 AM
@videovac - Ok, I mistook the actress.

Nathalie Emanuel is from the "Fast and Furious" series. Stenberg is the name I was thinking of.

Oh well... shoot me for that error.

No need to turn this into a race thing with "I know all black people look alike."

That being said, I agree that this site needs edit features so I'll agree with you there.
spr0cks
spr0cks - 4/24/2025, 4:05 PM
@videovac -
I mean, that's an easy mistake to make since Amandla Stenberg did play Storm in the X-Men : Day of Apocalypse movie.
.....
....
.....
....
....
...
I KEED!!! I KEEED!!!

Of course, I know it wasn't Stenberg.
Come on.
That's one of Zendaya's best roles outside MJ.

/s
tvor03
tvor03 - 4/23/2025, 4:45 PM
People do realize that lots of people get premiere invites, including many celebrities who had nothing to do with the movie. When I was an intern, one of my jobs was putting together invitations for premieres. I had a list of over 200 actors and actresses that had no affiliation with the movie. It's just to generate buzz.
videovac
videovac - 4/23/2025, 7:05 PM
I'm just throwing this out there: Nathalie Emmanuel was used as a reference point for the Jean Gray artwork that was leaked from Sony's Wolverine PlayStation game. If you think aim lying look it up yourself.

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