Popverse's top stories

• Where to find Popverse at Seattle's Emerald City Comic Con 2026
• The Traitors US alum Bob the Drag Queen drops a piece of advice for future players: "You are not as good at this game as you think you are"
• Bridgerton season 4 ending explained - did Benedict and Sophie make it work, and who's leaving the show for good?

Marvel’s surprise reveal of the Avengers: Doomsday cast offered an unexpected side benefit of allowing Marvel to respond to rumored “leaks” of the plots of the upcoming Thunderbolts* movie.

As is traditional with an upcoming Marvel project, social media has been inundated with “leaks” of the plot of Thunderbolts*, most of which have been contradictory in some form or another, just to underscore how unreliable (read: likely entirely fictional) they really are. There were, however, two recurring rumors that appeared in such “leaks” over and over again:

• Bucky Barnes will die early in the movie
• The Thunderbolts will die before the end of the movie

Now that Lewis Pullman, Wyatt Russell, Sebastian Stan, Florence Pugh, et al have been confirmed for the new Avengers movie, it would definitely seem to at least be implied that they're going to survive Thunderbolts* in one piece — or else, they’re showing up as ghosts or flashbacks to such a degree that they’re being listed with the main cast of the film. Take that, people looking to spoil a movie with entirely incorrect plot synopses!

While the casting announcement was timed to accompany the start of production on Avengers: Doomsday, it’s fun to see the knock-on effect of it also allowing the studio to quietly push back against rumors in a method that’s traditionally not available. Let’s see more of this in the future… although perhaps not in the form of another livestream that lasts more than two hours, please.

Want more? Make sure you've read our list of all the best Marvel Comics stories of all time, and get ready for all the free Marvel comics coming as part of this year's Free Comic Book Day / Comics Giveaway Day events.