We're taking this with a pinch of salt for now, but the moderators of the r/DCULeaks Reddit page are claiming that Thunderbolts has lost actor Steve Yeun.
No additional context has been provided beyond him dropping out and, if there is any truth to these claims, the trades will likely chime in with confirmation shortly. This doesn't make a whole lot of sense based on what else we've been hearing but with Thunderbolts undergoing changes after the Hollywood strikes - which saw it pushed back by more than seven months - the role may have evolved in a way Yeun is unhappy with.
Again, this is only a rumour and it's not one we're 100% buying quite yet. The aforementioned moderators have shared what appear to be some pretty reliable scoops in recent months; however, this is a wild claim, particularly with cameras expected to begin rolling on the MCU movie in the coming months.
The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman recently confirmed that Yeun will play The Sentry (revealing he'd been for a costume fitting), while scooper Daniel Richtman shared a post only yesterday claiming the actor's superhero costume is among the best Marvel Studios has ever dreamed up.
"It kind of came together in a weird way," Yeun said of his casting last year. "Jake Schreier, who did episodes of Beef, he got the gig to direct it and he kinda saw me for this role, and I read the role, and I was like 'This is actually a really interesting role, I’d be down to explore this.'"
"I think it’s less about now checking things off a bucket list and more looking at an experience," he continued. "It’s more like ‘Do I want to experience that?’ Putting it out is a whole other thing that I’m gonna have to prepare for afterwards, but in the immediate, I’m just down to just experience that experience."
We'll keep you updated as this story develops.
Tellingly, Richtman posted this around the time the rumour dropped:
In the comics, Steve Rogers was initially the only person the Super Soldier Serum worked on. Other government agencies struggled to create their own versions, and it was in the late 1940s that Project: Sentry was first dreamed up.
Meant to be 100,000 more powerful than the serum that created Captain America, the project ultimately got bogged down in red tape. However, years later, a meth addict called Robert Reynolds broke into the laboratory of one of the professors who worked on that and ingested the "Golden Sentry Serum" while looking for a fix.
With that, he gained the power of a million exploding suns, later becoming one of the Marvel Universe's greatest superheroes. There was a twist, though, as The Void - Reynolds' repressed personality - later emerged and took the form of a shadowy monster every bit as powerful as the Golden Guardian. It killed millions and continued to plague The Sentry in the years that followed.
Thunderbolts' confirmed cast members include Julia Louis-Dreyfus as Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, Florence Pugh as Yelena Boleva, Sebastian Stan as Bucky Barnes, David Harbour as Red Guardian, Wyatt Russell as U.S. Agent, Hannah John-Kamen as Ghost, and Olga Kurylenko as Taskmaster.
Written by Eric Pearson and Lee Sung Jin, and directed by Jake Schreier, Thunderbolts is currently set to be released in theaters on July 25, 2025.