Marvel’s Thunderbolts - Shame and Touching the Void

Spoiler Alert: This blog contains major plot details from Marvel’s Thunderbolts.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe has never been short on spectacle. But in Thunderbolts, the final battle is not one of fists or fire. It’s something far more intimate—and far more human. The enemy is not a villain bent on world domination. It’s shame. Deep, corrosive shame. And the victory isn’t won by defeating it in combat, but by choosing to love through it.

Among the ensemble of misfits and anti-heroes, one story quietly holds the emotional center: Bob Reynolds—the Sentry. A man of near-limitless power, but also near-limitless pain. Although the Sentry program gives him godlike strength, the fracture in Bob’s mind doesn’t start in a lab. It begins much earlier—in childhood.

The film subtly but powerfully reveals flashbacks of Bob’s home life: his parents’ abusive marriage and the harsh words echoing in his memory—“You always make things worse.” Long before he could fly or lift buildings, Bob carried the weight of a deeper wound: the belief that he was the problem. That he ruined things just by being there.

That is the seed of the Void—not just a destructive force, but the embodiment of Bob’s fear that he is, at his core, unlovable. Beyond repair. Beyond redemption.

His powers only amplify that fear. Because if you already believe your presence brings harm, imagine what happens when you can level cities. As his power grows, so does his isolation. As Bob says at one point, “It would be better for everyone if I just stayed down here.”

One of the most haunting elements in Thunderbolts is how the Void affects others. When Bob, or the Void through him, touches a teammate, it doesn’t just throw them across the room or drain their strength. It sends them inward—into their own moments of deepest shame.

For Yelena Belova, it’s the memory of luring her friend to her death. For John Walker, it’s neglecting his crying son and snapping at his wife. For Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, it’s the unbearable weight of unknowingly helping her father’s killer.

Each is sent into a kind of soul-prison—a room not made of walls, but of memory and regret. And what’s chilling is how easily the Void finds those places. How close to the surface their shame really is.

Because this isn’t just Bob’s story. It’s theirs. And it’s ours.

We all carry moments like that. Things we did, or things done to us. Things that make us pull away, build walls, or believe we’ll never be free. Shame isolates us—but it also affects all of us. Not in a way that binds us like joy or love, but in the sense that no one escapes it. Shame is a shared human burden. And perhaps in recognizing that—we begin to find the courage to speak, to reach out, to no longer face it alone.

And then comes the final act.

Bob—locked in a desperate battle with the Void, striking it with all his might—begins to falter. The darkness is overtaking him. And then, Yelena draws near. Not to fight. Not to subdue. But to reassure him, “You are not alone.” And one by one each of the Thunderbolts moves towards him too, loving Bob in the place of his greatest fear.

It’s a reversal of everything we’ve seen.

Earlier in the film, Bob’s touch—twisted by shame and the Void—sent each of them into their most hidden wounds. His touch isolated. It exposed. It trapped them in silence.

But now, their touch liberates him.

They don’t come in fear, but in love. They come not to push him away, but to draw close. And in that moment, something shifts. Not just in Bob—but in them. The Void begins to loosen. And the rooms of shame? They start to dissolve.

For those shaped by the Christian story, this resonates deeply.

Because at the center of the Gospel is not a God who just tells us to do better—but one who draws near. Jesus comes to us not when we’ve conquered our shame, but when we are still locked inside it. He steps into our broken stories, not to expose us, but to heal us.

He knows our most shameful rooms—and He doesn’t turn away. He touches the untouchable. He sits with the grieving. He welcomes the outcast. He comes near in His Son, and even now, He is present with us by His Spirit—our comforter, our companion, the one who says, again and again, “You are not alone.”

Yes, one day, every tear will be wiped away. When Jesus returns, the shame will be no more. But until then, we are given His presence—and a community to carry each other through. A people who reach out, say “I’m here for you,” and stand beside us in the places we once kept hidden.

Thunderbolts doesn’t give us a clean fix. But it does show us the first step of healing: to stop hiding, and to allow ourselves to be seen and loved by others — and ultimately by the One whose love never lets us go.