MONTHLY MARVEL MUSINGS
What should Marvel Studios do if they get Spidey back?
I mentioned briefly last month that, following e-mails leaked during the Sony hack, it has emerged that Sony have had conversations about sharing Spiderman, in some capacity, with Marvel Studios - potentially allowing the character in to forthcoming Marvel movies such as Captain America: Civil War, and Avengers: Infinity War. Well, since I posted that article there were more revelations, leading to rumours that Sony were looking likely to give Spiderman back to Marvel Studios - and then counter rumours suggesting a third Andrew Garfield starring Amazing Spiderman film would be going ahead, despite this.
Whatever happens, it does seem very likely that at some point - perhaps as soon as this year, but maybe more likely towards the end of the decade - Marvel Studios WILL be getting the rights to Spiderman; and seeing as how the last few Spider-man films have, for the most part, been fan disappointments (even if the box office hasn‘t reflected this), combined with Marvel's own track record for getting their character rights, this will be greatly welcomed. Having said that, integrating Spiderman in to the MCU won't be straight-forward - Marvel Studios would be foolish to simply re-boot the character a third time, from scratch, as this would further harm movie-goers' regard of the character (remember, this past year Spidey was out-grossed at the US box-office by the less popular Captain America, and the almost totally unknown Guardians of the Galaxy).
There is a need to move the character forward, but at the same time it feels disingenuous to not acknowledge that - even in the most flawed of his franchise's films - there has been some great things about Spidey's movies, and these things shouldn't be dismissed: how perfectly Raimi's first two films captured the heart and tone of the character; how great Andrew Garfield has been as a believable New York Teenager; and how fantastic and believable was the portrayal of his and Gwen Stacy's relationship in the Amazing Spiderman films, if nothing else.
Not that I would ever have the chance to pitch a new Spiderman film to Kevin Feige and the other executives, but if by some miracle I did, or was able to have the ear of someone who could, this is how I would suggest to Marvel Studios they should launch their own Spidey Franchise:
Firstly, Spiderman should be Miles Morales: in the comics there is a more 'mature' version of the Marvel characters published under the 'Ultimate' headline (in this sense, mature means that characters have been known to have incestuous relationships with siblings, or engage in spousal abuse). In the Ultimate Spiderman series the writers did the almost unthinkable and actually killed Peter Parker; this wasn't the end of the series as a new character emerged, gaining Spiderman's powers, and taking on the mantle to carry one the fight against crime in New York city. Miles Morales is the name of the young man who has gone on to fill Spiderman's, erm, spandex in the Ultimate series; at the time he took over the fact he's mixed race (Black-Hispanic) got the most headlines, but that's not necessarily why Marvel Studios should chose to focus their new Spiderman franchise on him (though it's a good reason!). Doing this would create sufficient space from the previous Spiderman films, which have focussed on the classic Peter Parker incarnation of the character, which would help audiences to accept another new Spiderman franchise. It would also allow Marvel Studios to focus on new stories and enemies for the character, without having to shoe-horn the Oscorp back-story in with it, as well as villains that have already been handled so memorably (e.g. Spider-man 2's Doc Ock). If Marvel Studios had had the rights to Spidey right from the off, there would have been interesting potential for Oscorp to feature as a dark-mirror to Stark Industries, perhaps even building to 'Dark Avengers' storyline - but after all that has occurred (and is about to happen) in the MCU it might be too much of a distraction and a muddle to add this. It's important to note, however, as in the comics Miles Morales is not totally disconnected from Peter Parker, and this is something that would have to be acknowledged.
Secondly, Miles Morales would still be following in the footsteps (or webs?) of Peter Parker: whilst the new Miles Morales-centred Spidey franchise should rightly distance itself in some ways from the previous films to justify a new version, at the same time I believe it should acknowledge the previous version(s) of the character. I would suggest the way to do this is to use a plot device whereby Morales, who has only recently acquired his Spider abilities and is still getting to grips with them, is aided through this by someone who knew Peter Parker and tells Morales about Peter's highs and lows as Spiderman. This would give opportunity to flash-back to great and defining Spiderman moments, such as his fights with his many great villainous foes, the loss of his girlfriend, his marriage to Mary Jane Watson, and throughout how his late Uncle Ben continuously informed his desire to live up to the responsibility of his powers. Doing this would address the inevitable criticisms that Spiderman is best associated with Peter Parker, and therefore portrayals should only be based on him; at the same time satisfying fans' demands for more of the 'classic' Spiderman on screen. This would also provide an opportunity to explore the legacy of the Peter Parker Spiderman stories, and previous films, if the character sharing these stories is a familiar one - I would suggest it is an individual identifying themselves as Harry Osborn, here a much older man. I believe that these flashbacks would need to have a full commitment to moving on from Peter Parker to Morales - ultimately, they should depict Parker's death. In the Ultimate comics he dies finally defeating his arch nemesis Green Goblin, aka Norman Osborne. Showing this onscreen would not only allow the audience to finally see closure to the portrayal of Spiderman as Peter Parker, but enable to them to accept the need for Morales as the hero. But this wouldn't be the end of Parker's legacy, as we'll see later...
Thirdly, these flashbacks should be of several years, a few decades even, before Morales' time: Spiderman dates back to the 1960's, and he's had many great adventures anchored in that decade and each that have followed. As well as that, his franchise has so far spread almost 15 years. I believe that a Morales centred Spiderman franchise should have him following on from Peter Parker many years after him. This would allow the new franchise to further create distance from the previous versions, yet allowing them to be regarded as legitimate takes on Spiderman - they've not been totally retconned out of existence. This would also help Marvel Studios address questions about why Spiderman wasn't present in the events of significant movies in the MCU - for example, it can be rightly argued that if Spiderman were around during the events of 'Avengers Assemble' he would surely have swung in to help stop an alien attack in his home city! Also, why weren't SHIELD intervening in Oscorp's development of dangerous science, leading to the creation of many super-villains? If the new Spiderman franchise shows that Peter Parker's adventures took place before the turn of the millennium, perhaps in the 1980's even, then it would account for no mention of Oscorp in the dealings of SHIELD from the time Tony Stark first suited up; they're already dealt with and filed away in SHIELD's archives. Also, as the classic Spidey is associated with so much pre-millennial science and tech, portraying him at some point before the turn of this century makes further sense. But perhaps the Oscorp business shouldn't be COMPLETELY tied up...
Finally, in a twist, 'Harry' would actually turn out to be Norman Osborn! Towards the end of the film, having faced and overcome his own nemesis (in one story Morales discovers his uncle, who had been mentoring him as Spiderman, was actually a supervillain, which would be a good story to base his first adventure around), it is revealed that the person recounting Parker's story is actually the one and only Green Goblin himself! This would not necessarily be part of some nefarious scheme (doing so might cheapen Parker's death in the audience's eyes), but perhaps an example of the madness and personality disorders that frequently gripped Osborn during his tenure as the Goblin. In this case, it could be that in recounting Parker's story he unblocks the amnesia that had made him forget that he was in fact the Green Goblin. Doing this would allow acknowledgement of the character's portrayals in the previous films, by each actor (Morales can say something along the lines 'but you died fighting Peter Parker!' and the Goblin would tell him that was in fact his son, Harry). It would also allow a triumphant end to the legacy of Parker as Spiderman if the Goblin was defeated once and for all by his successor - again, giving audiences another reason to accept the new version and move on from the previous incarnations of Spidey.
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| Could Spiderman be part of the next decade‘s Avengers line-up on the big screen? |
Ultimately, going forward from this they will have given themselves freedom and scope to have Spidey doing whatever they want- joining the Avengers (or the New Avengers, as it may well be after the events of Infinity War); not to mention a potentially solid new franchise after the likes of Chris Evans, Hemsworth and Robert Downy Jr have moved on from the trademark roles of Captain America, Thor and Iron Man, respectively; with their contracts expired after Avengers: Infinity War, Marvel Studios will need some characters with the audience-pulling power to keep their MCU franchise going.
That's it for this month - by this time next month we'll have seen a new trailer of Avengers: Age of Ultron so expect som chatter about that, and the Ant-Man trailer, amongst other things!
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