If superhero films are a genre (which they are), then the ragtag team of misfits is definitely a subgenre. Perhaps made popular thanks to James Gunn who spun gold four times over with three Guardians of the Galaxy films and his reboot The Suicide Squad, there is a joy in seeing people who shouldn't work together find common ground.

With the MCU in a state of flux where good projects are as common as ones that don't get as much love, it would be hard not to view this film with scepticism. After all it's not too long since the divisive Captain America: Brave New World, and yet with this outing Marvel seems to have thrown a curve ball.

Director Jake Schreier may seem like a strange choice given his previous two films were indie spirited outings Robot & Frank and Paper Towns, while he won plaudits for miniseries Beef. But, maybe that is why Thunderbolts* (yes the asterisk is explained) works.

The film follows disparate characters from the wider MCU – Yelena Belva (Florence Pugh), Red Guardian (David Harbour), Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan), Ghost (Hannah John-Kamen), John Walker (Wyatt Russell) and Taskmaster (Olga Kurylenko) who find themselves in conflict with government official Valentina (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) when they uncover an amnesiac civilian (Lewis Pullman) while on a mission.

While other Marvel films have dealt in big themes like colonialism, government surveillance and teen angst few have ever really examined mental illness. The closest would be Tony's brushes with PTSD in Iron Man 3, or Thor's depression in Avengers: Endgame but for a film to make it the soul focus and to a degree the villain is a bold move. Schreier has some early fun when the misfits meet for the first time and have ongoing friction. There's a fun sequence of them trying to walk up an elevator shaft, there's also a fun Terminator 2 style bike and car shoot ‘em up chase, but slowly the film begins to reveal it's true intentions.

This is a film about people who feel empty inside, their mistakes and wrongdoings haunt them and while they may act tough, each one has a conflict inside that needs to come out. There is less reliance on overarching narrative in the wider universe or cameos this time around. Instead the film puts these people in a situation where the literal void of emotional darkness begins to swallow them.

To see a billion dollar film force super-heroic comic book characters to address the nature of despair, of feeling suicidal, of burying their feelings in bravado, lies and drink is ballsy. It's helped that not one of the ensemble is weak, though Pugh leads the film with her usual strength and wit; but Pullman as the new addition to the universe feels like the real stand out. Perhaps the film's signature moment is a moment of pure Hollywood heroism immediately cut down by something even worse that will shock audiences.

There are issues in the pacing, the first half is very concerned with government hearings and a subplot with Wendell Pierce which by the middle of the second act is ignored almost completely, and there is occasional questionable CGI when people are being thrown around a room in a mid-film smack down.

It's ironic that a film about the void of depression and facing one's own internal conflict can be such a joy, but then again… films, like people, can contain paradoxes and multitudes.

Thunderbolts* is in cinemas from 1st May