Did Marvel Just Inadvertently Announce the Title of Its ‘Spider-Man’ Movie?
We may have been too pumped about the 'Guardians of the Galaxy 2' announcement to notice.
It was just a year ago that Sony announced that it’d team up with Marvel to bring an official Marvel Cinematic Universe reboot of your friendly, neighborhood Spider-Man to the big screen, following the failed franchise reboots of The Amazing Spider-Man and its sequel. It was a win-win for everybody. Sony would cut their losses by bringing the web slinger home, while Marvel would give fans what they wanted by inserting actor Tom Holland as Peter Parker and his alter ego into the intertwined drama of their various superhero movies — first in a cameo in May’s Captain America: Civil War — before giving him his own standalone feature. The official title for the film — which is to be released on July 7, 2017 — hasn’t been announced, but a statement from Marvel may have let the spider out of the bag.
Fans went nuts for yesterday’s press release touting the production-start of director James Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, which boasted new additions to the cast like Pom Klementieff, Elizabeth Debicki, and Chris Sullivan. Most importantly, Kurt Russell, aka Snake Plissken himself, joined up, too. There wasn’t much else besides that, other than what Marvel rattled off in the fine print.
While basking in their previous successes like The Avengers, Iron Man 3, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Guardians of the Galaxy, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Ant-Man, and more, Marvel also listed their upcoming films. Here’s what they had to say:
“Captain America: Civil War on May 6, 2016; Doctor Strange, November 4, 2016; Spider-Man, July 7, 2017; and Thor: Ragnarok on November 3, 2017.”
Did you catch that? Spider-Man is hitting theaters on July 7 of 2017. All of Marvel’s releases up to 2019’s Inhumans have official titles, with the Spidey movie being the only one that doesn’t have an official Marvel-sanctioned name. We can surmise that Marvel’s Spider-Man movie will be titled, quite simply, Spider-Man.
It’s the same name as the 2002 Tobey Maguire-starring movie that first brought the character to the big-screen. It, without a doubt, is a curious move. When Marvel got the rights to the Hulk they titled that movie, The Incredible Hulk to make it distinct. It seems Marvel might bring one of their biggest and most iconic characters back for a second reboot, and just tell it like it is.
It may be that Marvel is just using the simple title as a placeholder until it announces whatever the title will be. Maybe it’s Spectacular Spider-Man or Ultimate Spider-Man or the rumored title that was going around early last year: Spider-Man: The New Avenger.
Spider-Man — we’re sticking with that title until further notice — which is directed by Jon Watts and written by John Francis Daley and Jonathan M. Goldstein, swings into theaters next year.
