‘Ant-Man’ director seems innocently oblivious to the casting furor created by one of his former stars

Not wanting something until you can’t have it is a basic human emotion that applies to virtually all aspects of life, and in the case of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Thunderbolts, the sentiment put Hannah John-Kamen’s Ghost in its sights.

Making her debut in Ant-Man and the Wasp, it wouldn’t be unfair to suggest that nobody was holding up the antagonist as one of the franchise’s greatest-ever villains, which was also understandable when up until the introduction of Jonathan Majors’ Kang the Conqueror in Quantumania, director Peyton Reed’s series hadn’t been renowned for top-tier baddies.

And yet, when rumors began to swirl that Ghost had either been dropped from Thunderbolts or John-Kamen had walked away from the project, the matter-shifting menace suddenly became everybody’s favorite. That’s generally how things tend to go, but when discussing her involvement in the antihero ensemble flick with Entertainment Tonight, Reed didn’t seem to realize that the speculation regarding her appearance – or lack thereof – had gone into overdrive.

“I love it. Hannah is fantastic, and I love her in that role. And I love what we were doing in that movie, which is to sort of create not a villain, necessarily, but an antagonist who just was the result of this horrible accident and was sort of pulled into service as an assassin. We gave her sort of a redemption arc, and I love to see that she’s going to live to fight, in one way or another, another day. I’m stoked about that.”

There hasn’t been an official confirmation or denial as to whether or not Ghost will be in or out when cameras start rolling, but seeing as Thunderbolts is expected to begin production within the next few months, it won’t be long until we find out.