Exclusive: Marvel Studios boss Kevin Feige explains why they brought back old Spider-Man villains to fight Tom Holland in Spider-Man: No Way Home.
Kevin Feige explains why they decided to bring back old Spider-Man villains in Spider-Man: No Way Home. Marvel Studios and Sony's latest collaboration project will see Tom Holland reprise his role as Peter Parker for his third solo film. This time, he's set to go up against familiar villains from Sam Raimi's and Marc Webb's respective Spider-Man movies.
Marketing for Spider-Man: No Way Home has been expertly crafted to keep plot secrets intact, but while fans are still waiting for any concrete indication that Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield are involved, the movie's promos have no problem focusing on the story's villains instead. Doc Ock was the first to appear in trailers after Alfred Molina previously confirmed his involvement. Subsequently, Willem Dafoe's Green Goblin and Jamie Foxx's Electro were also shown, alongside Rhys Ifans' Lizard and Thomas Haden Church's Sandman. Based on what's known about the movie, these villains make their way to the MCU after Doctor Strange's (Benedict Cumberbatch) tampered spell accidentally opens the multiverse. But, outside of the narrative, what really motivated Marvel Studios and Sony to bring them back?
In an exclusive interview with Screen Rant, Feige offers an explanation. The MCU architect cites how their current partnership with Sony proves that "almost anything is possible if enough people believe in it." Given that, they were motivated to offer fans something that they've never seen before. With the involvement of Doctor Strange, they had the opportunity to make a lot of typically impossible things happen, including bringing these old villains from past Spider-Man franchises:
I think if we've learned anything over the years, and particularly just the deal between Disney and Sony to do these movies together, that almost anything is possible if enough people believe in it and have a passion for it. Kicking off with Peter Parker's identity being revealed at the end of Far From Home immediately set us on a course for things we'd never seen before in a Spider-Man movie. That's the fun of making movies, is to do things people haven't seen before, and in the MCU there are ways that lots of amazing things can happen, and that Dr. Strange would be a good conduit to that.
As the face of Marvel Studios for years, Feige has perfected the art of giving a non-answer. While his comment doesn't reveal anything plot-specific, opting to focus on the actual process of deciding to bring the old Spider-Man villains back, it's interesting that his storytelling approach remains consistent. Marvel Studios' Spider-Man trilogy has differentiated itself from its predecessors by telling new stories. It's exactly the reason why they decided to skip rehashing the character's origins story, as it had been done twice before. Instead, they debuted Holland's wall-crawler in Captain America: Civil War in an effort to efficiently incorporate him into the bigger MCU before sending him off to his own adventures.
It's worth noting, however, that Spider-Man: Far From Home set up a significantly different film than what Spider-Man: No Way Home appears to be. With Peter's superhero identity out in the open, many assumed that the threequel will primarily be about that. In fact, Kraven the Hunter was even rumored to be its villain. Granted that Mysterio's (Jake Gyllenhaal) malicious dying video kicks off the movie's story, it's no longer the central point of the project, as it's more focused on its multiversal aspect.
