Thunderbolts director says he doesn't see Yelena and Bob's relationship as "romantic": "That wasn't what we were going for"

Sorry, Boblena shippers – Thunderbolts* director Jake Schreier doesn't really see their relationship as romantic.

Bob (AKA Sentry) is played by Lewis Pullman in the Marvel Phase 5 movie, with Yelena played by Florence Pugh.

"I have seen the Boblena stuff. I think it's really cute. I don't view it as a romantic relationship, personally," Schreier told Collider. "But I think we knew that Lewis and Florence having chemistry, regardless of whether that's romantic chemistry or not, that relationship is so central to the movie that it's not a bad thing to have some amount of that."

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Romance wasn't strictly what the movie was aiming for, he explained. "We were very clear there was never a discussion of, like, 'Is this romantic or not?' I don't think we wanted to cheapen that being there for each other in darker times and the way all of them connect to that idea. That wasn't what we were going for."

He added: "You've got these great actors and so little narrative real estate to build this connection between them before they're kind of ripped apart, and then that connection is going to determine the end of the film. Getting their relationship right is so important… if we did get that right, people would enjoy watching them together. And the internet is the internet.”

We'll next see the Thunderbolts in Marvel Phase 6, since they're all confirmed to appear in Avengers: Doomsday. Whether Bob and Yelena's relationship develops any further remains to be seen, then.

Of course, another thing that remains to be seen is whether the Thunderbolts will remain the New Avengers, as they were retitled at the end of the movie. Anthony Mackie's Sam Wilson is also confirmed to appear in Doomsday, and so is Pedro Pascal's Reed Richards, who will apparently be leading the Avengers in the future.

Next up for Marvel is The Fantastic Four: First Steps, which hits theaters this July 24 in the UK and July 25 in the US. In the meantime, check out our guide to all the upcoming Marvel movies and shows for everything else the MCU has in store.