Following The Walking Dead actor Steven Yeun’s voluntary exit from the role, a new rumor – and one that is admittedly a tad hard to believe given that it, if true, would see the franchise actually reversing course on one of their previous identity-politics-inspired casting decisions in favor of comic book accuracy – suggests that Marvel Studios’ current frontrunner to succeed him as the Sentry in their upcoming Thunderbolts film is none other than Top Gun: Maverick star Lewis Pullman.
RELATED: Rumored Race-Swapped Sentry Actor Steven Yeun Reportedly Exits Marvel’s “Thunderbolts”
Marvel’s interest in Pullman, who played the bespectacled Lt. Robert “Bob” Floyd in the aforementioned 2022 blockbuster, to portray the Golden Guardian of Good was first raised to the public courtesy of a joint-exclusive provided by noted scooper Daniel ‘DanielRPK’ Richtman and the /r/DCEULeaks subreddit.
Taking to his personal Twitter account on January 25th, “In collaboration with @rDCUleaks, I can report that Lewis Pullman has the current offer for Sentry in Thunderbolts.”
This rumor would be lent further weight later that same day when, ostensibly relaying information provided to them by the outlet’s own insider sources, The Hollywood Reporter‘s Aaron Couch likewise claimed that Pullman was not only “Marvel’s top choice” for the role, but already “has an offer for the role”.
As previously reported, after initially being cast to portray arguably the Marvel canon’s most powerful hero, Yeun dropped out of Marvel’s Thunderbolts on January 3rd.
At the time, the exact reasons for his exit were unknown. However, a day later, the Invincible lead voice actor told Variety’s Michaela Zee and Marc Malkin that his decision was the result of various scheduling conflicts, some of which were exacerbated by last year’s SAG-AFTRA strike.
“I think for me, time passing and things shifting kind of pulled me out of it,” Yeun told the outlet. “But [director] Jake [Schreier], I know, is going to do an incredible job.”
Assuring the public that he still wanted to “do a Marvel movie,” the actor then recalled of his departure, “It took a lot of drafts on email to make sure that I conveyed the sincerity of how sorry I was to have to back out.”
Pressed by the pair as to which Marvel film’s, should he get the chance, the actor would like to join, Yeun playfully laughed, “I think it’s too early to say that. I probably pissed off too many people leaving, so I’m just gonna say, ‘Thank you for having me.'”
“I have some ideas,” he then noted. “But I heard if you put it out there, you’ll never get it, so I’ll keep it close to my chest.”
As noted above, should Pullman actually be cast as Sentry, it would represent a very stark change in Marvel Studios’ production philosophy.
Since roughly Avengers: Endgame – and more specifically the ‘girl power’ moment during the Battle of Earth – the studio has taken to using their films not as entertainment vehicles, but activist platforms for them to promote their various sociopolitical beliefs, often at the expense of the comic book source material itself.
However, in light of this casting move – as well as their bringing back of Wilson Bethel’s Bullseye, Deborah Ann Woll’s Karen Page, and Elden Henson’s Foggy Nelson for Daredevil: Born Again following their being left out of the series’ first draft – it seems that Marvel may be making at least some effort to wright their sinking cinematic ship.
But as time has shown, good casting does not automatically indicate that a Marvel Cinematic Universe production will treat their character well – After all, look at what happened to Vincent D’Onofrio’s Kingpin in Echo.
As such, fans would do best to keep a cautious eye towards Marvel’s Thunderbolts until they can see the final product in theaters starting on July 25th, 2025.