Thunderbolts, the latest big-screen release from Marvel Studios (which is also its final Phase Five film), goes the Suicide Squad route, bringing together a group of degenerate anti-heroes in the name of the greater good.

Florence Pugh leads a crew of scrappy misfits. It’s a familiar premise, “Suicide Squad” did the same thing, but here it works.

The answer, of course, is that “Thunderbolts” has no more indie cred than “Avatar.” What it is, though, is the best Marvel movie in years. “Thunderbolts,” about a group of MCU rejects who band together after CIA director Valentina Allegra de Fontaine ( Julia Louis-Dreyfus ) tries to erase them and their covert program,