Women of Summer

This summer, women are taking over the box office. From raunchy comedies to title superheroes to dreary dramas, this season's slate is chock full of powerful ladies, starting with the cast of Sofia Coppola's reboot of the 1971 western drama-thriller The Beguiled.

It's been a great year for Nicole Kidman. Not only did she star in HBO's acclaimed small screen drama Big Little Lies, but she leads in The Beguiled, about an all-girls boarding school headmistress who takes in a wounded soldier, turning the house into a sexually charged and dangerous abode for everyone involved.

Kirsten Dunst has been on a career hot streak lately, too. The former child star has enjoyed spurts of critical favor, thanks to her recent turns in Melancholia and TV's Fargo, and with The Beguiled, she'll get to enter the same sort of dreary on-screen atmosphere that has informed her most successful turns to date.

It's no secret that Zoe Saldana has become the "it" girl of sci-fi blockbuster fare, and Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 will only continue her streak as the woman who's successfully churned out tentpole after tentpole. She'll return as the bombshell alien Gamora, who's so much more than just eye candy for the Guardians team.

Although she's a bit hard to recognize beneath all of the prosthetic makeup she sports in the Guardians of the Galaxy films, Karen Gillan is a face you should count on seeing a lot of in the near future. Her character Nebula is expected to return for GotG2 and Avengers: Infinity War, and she'll star in the remake of Jumanji.

As the title star of Wonder Woman, Gal Gadot is on the verge of a major breakout this year. Princess Diana may have made her debut in Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, but Wonder Woman is her turn to shine as the Amazon Princess, and she'll get to play with the rest of the Justice League afterward as well.

It's been too long since we've gotten to see Jada Pinkett Smith in her ensemble element, but Girls Trip is the perfect vehicle to showcase her comedic wit. Together with Queen Latifah, Regina Hall, and Tiffany Haddish, she'll remind us all what it as that made her such a force in her '90s showcases like Set It Off and Woo.

Scarlett Johansson has arrived as one of the most powerful women in show business thanks to her box office earnings in the superhero realm, but it'll be a refreshing change of pace to see her hit the comedy scene again in the ensemble comedy Rough Night, about a bachelorette party that goes horribly awry when the male stripper turns up dead.

Zoe Kravitz is on a career role at the moment, with back-to-back-to-back franchises under her belt a la X-Men: First Class, The Divergent Series, and The LEGO Batman Movie and after arriving as one of the breakout stars in HBO's drama series Big Little Lies, it'll be exciting to see her earn some laughs on the big screen for a change in Rough Night.

After impressing in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, Katherine Waterston is well on her way to the A-list, and her role in Ridley Scott's Alien: Covenant should do the trick. The London-born actress has been haunting the indie scene for over a decade, and it looks like she's finally ready for an eerie breakout in this Alien prequel.

Charlize Theron has enjoyed the rare career status that allows her to vacillate between big box office pics and small-time indies without interruption, and she's had no trouble maintaining her status as one of Hollywood's top earners in flicks like Mad Max: Fury Road and Prometheus. Atomic Blonde, however, will allow Theron to harken back to some of her career-defining roles as a sly assassin type, as seen in Aeon Flux, Reindeer Games, and The Italian Job.

Sofia Boutella is in for a big year in 2017, with starring roles in both Atomic Blonde and The Mummy reboot on tap for release this year. The Algerian actress has had no shortage of work in recent years, of course, starring in Kingsman: The Secret Service and Star Trek Beyond, among others, but this is the year her name will finally reach household status.