- The Thunderbolts/New Avengers battle Sentry in latest MCU film
- Sentry is quite comic book accurate – but for one major detail
- The plot of Spider-Man: No Way Home influenced this change in Sentry
The Thunderbolts*/New Avengers battled Sentry in the latest MCU film, but the character has had a major change from the comic book version – due to Spider-Man.
For the Thunderbolts*, when nobody else came to save the day, they went up against Sentry. The events of that lead them to becoming the New Avengers. This is something that was only revealed after the movie was released – and the cast had a hand in this.
Sentry has become an important character in the comics in the past 25 years, so there was understandable excitement about him making the transition to the MCU.
Spider-Man changes Sentry’s Thunderbolts* story
But while the MCU’s Sentry is quite true to his comic book origin, there is a big detail that has been changed – and the reason for it lies in Spider-Man: No Way Home.
In the comics, Sentry, who was first introduced in 2000, has a complex history. He struggles with being Sentry, but also The Void – the supervillain equivalent of the Sentry.
Sentry was one of the first superheroes, but he used magic to make the world forget about his powerss – including himself. Of course, making the world forget about you will be familiar to anyone who has watched the third Spider-Man movie. In Spider-Man: No Way Home (spoiler alert!) Peter Parker convinces Dr Strange to cast a spell to make the world forget about Spider-Man after he becomes public enemy number one when Mysterio frames him.
With the ‘making the world forget you’ trick already in play in the MCU, the creative team decided not to use the device again with a new (to the MCU) character.
Thunderbolts*’ director, Jake Schreier, told Marvel.com: “Obviously we couldn’t tell that same story because of Spider-Man: No Way Home,” he said.
Future for characters
However, (spoiler alert!) Sentry will likely return in future MCU films, but with The Void still there too. The character hasn’t been confirmed to be appearing in Avengers: Doomsday, but it is known that the full cast list hasn’t yet been revealed so that could be announced later.
Meanwhile, quite how having the world forget about him will play out for Spidey will be seen in Avengers: Doomsday as well as the upcoming Spider-Man 4 movie, which is slated for release next summer, shortly after the next Avengers movie.
