Marvel's ‘Thunderbolts' — instant Oscar predictions
The new movie from Jake Schreier (Beef) has garnered some of the best reviews for a Marvel movie since Spider-Man: No Way Home in 2021, signaling a modest return to form for the Marvel Cinematic Universe after recent misfires like Captan America: Brave New World, The Marvels, and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.
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The expectation is that Thunderbolts, with its cast led by Florence Pugh, David Harbour, and Sebastian Stan, will dominate the box office this weekend, and — at the very least — reinvigorate the MCU fanbase before The Fantastic Four: First Steps kick starts a new Marvel franchise in July. However, as with any Marvel movie, there's also the potential for Thunderbolts to factor into next year's Oscars race. While the movie is unlikely to garner recognition for its above-the-line contributors, it could find itself competitive in several craft categories — especially if awards voters buy into the Letterboxd bona fides of Thunderbolts, which Marvel touted by releasing an 'absolute cinema' teaser earlier this year.
Ahead, some instant Oscar predictions for Marvel's Thunderbolts.
Best Score
Among the notable artisans who worked on Thunderbolts are composers Son Lux, a trio of musicians fresh off an Oscar nomination for the score to Everything Everywhere All at Once. 'The score by experimental group Son Lux is a welcome shift away from orchestral bombast into more nuanced territory,' wrote David Rooney in his positive review of the movie for The Hollywood Reporter. While Best Score is traditionally highly competitive, and the argument could be made that Son Lux was carried to an Oscar nomination in 2023 because Everything Everywhere All at Once was such a phenomenon, the unique nature of the score could stand out.
'Any trepidation came from not knowing how we would fit into this world because the MCU is perhaps one of the most established things in cinema,' Rafiq Bhatia, one of the three members of Son Lux, told NME. 'But we soon discovered that Marvel and Jake wanted to do something different with this movie. We were just really excited about embarking on a journey of exploring what that different thing could be. Now that we're nearing the finish line, it's been a really rewarding experience.' If Son Lux ends up nominated, they would be only the second group of composers nominated for a Marvel movie; Ludwig Goransson, who won for Black Panther, is the only Marvel composer nominated in the category in MCU history.
Best Casting
No disrespect to Kevin Feige, but it's possible that few people have had more to do with the success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe than Sarah Halley Finn. The veteran casting director has cast every Marvel movie, except for The Incredible Hulk, and has also cast multiple Marvel television shows. (She's received Emmy nominations for casting WandaVision and the Star Wars series The Mandalorian.) Thunderbolts brings together multiple Marvel franchises and also finds room for new stars, like Lewis Pullman and Geraldine Viswanathan, and could put the casting legend in contention for the inaugural Best Casting Oscar, unless Finn loses out on a potential nomination to herself. She also put together the cast of The Fantastic Four: First Steps, which includes Pedro Pascal, Ebon Moss-Bachrach, Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn, and Julia Garner.
Best Visual Effects
In the end, the most obvious spot for Thunderbolts to compete for Academy recognition next year is Best Visual Effects. Of the 27 nominations Marvel has received in its lifespan, 14 have come in the effects category. However, one of the big selling points of Thunderbolts is that it's a smaller-scale adventure. So if any Marvel movie might continue the franchise's success in Best Visual Effects, it'll probably be The Fantastic Four: First Steps. Still, at this stage, it's safe to count Thunderbolts as one of the contenders for Best Visual Effects, even if it ultimately falls short next year.
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