Marvel

Florence Pugh shares her hopes for Yelena's character after 'Thunderbolts*'

By Sophia Soto | Last updated May 4, 2025 12:39 PM ET

With Thunderbolts* now playing in theaters, star Florence Pugh is opening up about her hopes for Yelena Belova going forward in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

In an interview with Variety, the actress explained, "I hope that she’s happy now. I hope that she feels fulfilled, like she has purpose. And I hope that we get to see some of her light and her charm and her color again, because I loved playing that before."

The character has already been confirmed to return for Avengers: Doomsday, which is scheduled for May 2026. When asked who she freaked out over in the cast list, she commented how "there’s too many people in it" to choose from before naming "Pedro Pascal, obviously, always and forever. Paul Rudd, yes, so funny." She continued to express, "Genuinely, the idea that all of those people are going to be in the same movie is nutso sauce."

As for Thunderbolts*, she mentioned how impressed she was that Marvel wanted to do "this version of the movie," adding, "This movie will help a lot of people. And the underlying message is that we need to be there for each other. We need to open up. We need to connect. Like that, to me is that would be an impressive movie anyway, let alone it being a Marvel movie that thousands of people are gonna go and watch."

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This film is also an on-screen reunion between her and David Harbour, who plays the Red Guardian and her character's adoptive father, after their MCU debut in 2021's Black Widow. There's a beautiful and impact moment between the two that apparently wasn't on the page.

"There was a version of it, and it was fine, but it didn’t allow us to shout about the important things. In the original script, there wasn’t anything to do with Natasha; it was all about them just finding each other annoying and that was just something that David and I were so adamant about. Like, we can’t not have these characters discuss the elephant in the room. We can’t have these two people be pretending as if the last however many years, didn’t happen," Pugh shared.

"They have to shout at each other. That’s what they’re angry about. They haven’t communicated with each other; they haven’t been in each other’s lives. And grief sometimes does that. Grief is a painful, embarrassing and horrible hole that you get stuck in," she further said. "They are both flawed, and they need a moment to just like, f*cking shout at each other and tell each other they love each other. So, we were very passionate about that — and Jake was so excited that we were — and we just went through versions of what we wanted to say to each other."

Sophia Soto

Sophia Soto is a writer and interviewer with a passion for all things entertainment. She is a Senior Reporter at The Nerds of Color and contributes to Yardbarker, Screensphere, Den of Geek, What to Watch, Nerdtropolis, and Temple of Geek. You can see her past work on Remezcla, Young Hollywood, Looper, Paste Magazine, Primetimer, Soundsphere, and Starry Constellation Magazine

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