The Sentry is fully consumed by The Void in Siege Vol. 1 #3 “The Siege of Asgard – Intercepted” (2010), Marvel Comics. Words by Brian Michael Bendis, art by Olivier Coipel, Mark Morales, Laura Martin, and Chris Eliopoulos.
In a rare instance where a given project’s established rules provide an ‘easy out’ for explaining away plot holes, Thunderbolts writer Eric Pearson says that the reason other New York based heroes like Spider-Man, Daredevil, or even Doctor Strange did not help the New Avengers in their battle against the Sentry is that, simply put, his “Void Space” operates on a different time scale from the real world.
[SPOILER WARNING: Significant spoilers for Marvel’s Thunderbolts follow below. If you’d like to avoid them, please refrain from reading any further.]
The Void (Lewis Pullman) emerges in Thunderbolts (2025), Marvel Entertainment
As seen in the final act of the surprising MCU sleeper hit, following his official ‘knighting’ as the Golden Guardian of Good by Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, the newly-christened Sentry soon finds himself consumed by both the awesome power he now possesses and the crippling loneliness that has plagued him throughout his entire life, as a result allowing his darker persona, The Void, just enough of an opening to assert full control of their shared body.
Finally freed, The Void proceeds to demonstrate his God-like powers to the masses, taking to the streets just outside of de Fonatine’s Watchtower (formerly Avengers Tower) and proceeding to expand an all-consuming, almost Biblical darkness upon New York City and its inhabitants.
Valentina Allegra de Fontaine (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) offers Bob (Lewis Pullman) the life of his dreams in Thunderbolts (2025), Marvel Entertainment
However, rather than being a fatal, physical manifestation, said darkness instead turns out to be a gateway of sorts which, after coming into contact with a given individual, consumes them alive and places them in a meta-physical dimension where they must physically relive their worst traumas, on loop, until the end of time.
Of course, punches, kicks, and bullets would do little against such power, so rather than an all-out brawl, the Thunderbolts instead take down The Void by willingly entering into his darkness, finding the Bob persona, and encouraging him to step back into the light.
The Void (Lewis Pullman) gives the world a demonstration of his power in Thunderbolts (2025), Marvel Entertainment
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All in all, the entire ordeal, from The Void’s appearance in the sky to de Fontaine’s self-serving, post-victory introduction of the team as the New Avengers lasts roughly thirty minutes of screen time.
Given the rather significant amount of timeframe of the fight, many fans understandably began to question why none of Earth-199999’s other NYC-based heroes – the list of which currently includes such noted crime-fighters as Spider-Man, Daredevil (and maybe the rest of the Defenders, though outside of Horn Head their canon status is currently up in the air), Dr. Strange, Kate Bishop, the Punisher, and even Ms. Marvel (who is technically in New Jersey, but hey, it’s just over the river) – showed up to lend Yelena and her team a hand in saving the day.
Peter Parker (Tom Holland) tunes into his Spider-Sense in Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021), Marvel Entertainment
While this discrepancy is an admitted example of the potential continuity errors that can result from attempting to portray a ‘grounded and fully-connected cinematic universe’ and would in the long-run just be accepted by audiences via their suspension of disbelief, the aforementioned Pearson still has an in-universe explanation as to why the Sentry faced such little opposition.
Pressed on the absence of NYC’s larger hero community during a recent interview with ScreenRant, Pearson began his response by playfully asserting, “I’m going to take the fifth on that one.”
“I haven’t looked at the map closely enough of where [The Void’s darkness] went,” he then explained. “I’m not sure if it went to Bleecker Street [where Doctor Stranger’s Sanctum Santorum is located] yet. But I also think that the time of it is happening so much faster than you expect. That expansion and retraction of time is different.”
“As we say in Thor: Ragnarok, ‘Time works real different around here,’” he added, referring to the explanation given in said film (which Pearson also co-wrote) as to the time oddities between Earth and the gladiatorial planet Sakaar. “When you’re in the Void Space, who knows how long it’s been? Maybe it’s been one second.”
Mel (Geraldine Wiswanathan) begins to have second thoughts about Valentina’s (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) plans in Thunderbolts (2025), Marvel Entertainment
Again, while it’s unlikely that Pearson and his Thunderbolts co-writer Joanna Calom genuinely intended for this ‘different time flows’ explanation being the actual reason why Sentry didn’t get a face full of webbing from Spider-Man, that this plausibility was left open by the film’s script can absolutely be counted as ‘an extremely lucky break’ for both of them.
Mentioned In This Article:Eric PearsonMarvelMarvel Cinematic UniverseMarvel StudiosSentryThunderbolts (2025)
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Eric Pearson says the different rules of ‘Void Space’ can explain why the ‘Thunderbolts’ saw no help from Spider-Man or Daredevil. Read More