The New 'Spider-Man' Movie Won’t Be an Origin Story
No radioactive spider bites on field trips, and no murders of certain relatives.
It seems like two Spider-Man origin stories were plenty.
Screenwriters John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein have been making the rounds for their latest movie, Vacation — which looks like it doesn’t have a shot at living up to the original classic — but they’ve mostly had to field questions about their next, much spidey-er project.
Last week we brought you the news that the new Spider-Man screenwriting pair confirmed actor Tom Holland’s role/cameo in the next Captain America movie. Now comes word about their approach to the yet-to-be-written script, which is looking more and more like a truly original, possibly funny project.
On the latest episode of Grantland’s The Andy Greenwald Podcast, Daley and Goldstein said we won’t have to deal with radioactive spiders on high school field trips or seeing Uncle Ben get brutally murdered yet again.
“I think that everybody feels like, you know he got bit by a spider and you know Uncle Ben died,” Goldstein said on the show. “We probably don’t need to revisit that.” Later, Daley added, “I think the stakes are increased in that his struggle through high school is very real and isn’t just sort of a side note. It matters now.”
This is definitely a step in the right direction, and one that probably won’t bother fans or dads looking for bonding moments with their Spidey-loving kids.
By our calculations, if this new reboot was an origin story it would have marked the fourth onscreen death for Uncle Ben, who previously was shot and killed in 2002’s original Spider-Man, died again in a flashback in Spider-Man 3, and did it all over again in 2012’s The Amazing Spider-Man. How many times does this dude have to get offed just to teach Peter Parker that with great power comes great responsibility? Just three, that’s how many.
Hopefully, by doing away with the origin story, the new Spider-Man can do what Daley says and just get to the awkward high school webslinging hijinks with a little bit of John Hughes-esque humor thrown in. Hell, The Amazing Spider-Man stretched its origin story for two movies and didn’t even explain much, so at least the new filmmakers have learned some lessons about what not to do.
