Florence Pugh Accidentally Recreated Yelena’s ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ Hairstyle, and Fans Caught It Instantly
Florence Pugh has never been shy about leaning into the internet’s obsession with her Marvel alter ego, Yelena Belova. Between resharing fan art and embracing viral moments from her scenes, Pugh has built a reputation as one of the more online-savvy actors when it comes to engaging directly with her fanbase.
That reputation traces back to earlier this year, when Yelena’s surprise cameo in ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day‘ turned into one of the film’s most talked-about moments. Her bathhouse scene with Tom Holland’s Peter Parker, complete with the now-iconic “small potato stuff” versus “big potato stuff” exchange, spawned a wave of memes that spread well beyond typical Marvel fan circles.
That same energy carried over into a recent exchange on Instagram, where a fan pointed out something Pugh herself hadn’t noticed. Responding to one of her posts, the fan wrote that her hairstyle matched Yelena’s messy updo from the ‘Brand New Day’ scene, joking that she had “went straight from office to attend big potato stuff.” Pugh replied with total enthusiasm, writing back, “OH MY GOD YOU ARE SO RIGHT! I didn’t catch that!”
The comparison lines up visually, with both looks featuring the same loosely piled-up blonde hair that became instantly recognizable once Yelena’s bathhouse scene went viral. For a character defined partly by her dry humor and disregard for personal boundaries, it tracks that even her hairstyle has become something fans instantly clock in the wild.
Yelena’s brief but memorable appearance in ‘Brand New Day’ marked her first on-screen interaction with Holland’s Spider-Man, bridging the gap between her role in ‘Thunderbolts*’ and her presumed involvement in future MCU projects following the team’s induction as the New Avengers. The scene itself, in which Yelena forces Peter to strip down in a Russian bathhouse while dismissing his problems as comparatively minor, quickly became one of the film’s most quoted moments.
Pugh has continued to engage with that scene’s popularity in the months since the film’s release, at one point sharing fan-created artwork of the bathhouse moment on her own Instagram story. That willingness to interact directly with how fans interpret and meme her performances has only deepened the connection between Pugh and the character, making moments like this latest hairstyle exchange feel like a natural extension of that ongoing back-and-forth.
With Yelena’s future in the MCU still very much in motion following her New Avengers status, it seems fans will keep finding new details to connect back to her most viral scene, whether that’s a catchphrase, a hairstyle, or something else entirely. Given how quickly Pugh jumps into these moments herself, it’s unlikely to be the last time she gets caught by surprise by her own fandom’s attention to detail.
Did you see the resemblance?
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