In stunning news first rumored by GWW and now confirmed by The Hollywood Reporter, Alfred Molina, the legendary actor for Dr. Otto Octavius/Dr. Octopus in Sam Raimi’s ‘Spider-Man 2’, has been cast in the MCU’s third-solo Spider-Man outing. However, to call it that may well be a misnomer, as Tom Holland’s trilogy concluder looks set to be the live-action SpiderVerse film that fans have sought after for years. With Jaime Foxx as Electro, Alfred Molina as Otto Octavius, Benedict Cumberbatch as Dr. Strange, the next Spidey-flick looks set to be an outing, unlike anything we have seen in live-action for the web head before. 2018’s: Spider-Man: Into The SpiderVerse became Sony Pictures Animation’s highest-grossing film and was critically beloved, currently holding a 97% score on Rotten Tomatoes among critics. Centered around Miles Morales and his ascension into becoming a new Spider-Man, the film featured everything from famous love interest Gwen Stacy as Spider-Man, to Spider-Ham: A cartoon logic, talking pig iteration of the web head. The wild antics, yet well-crafted and emotional narrative, led to the film’s success with audiences and critics alike, with the MCU now seeking to achieve their own smash-hit version of this formula.
Since 2002, we have had three live-action Spiderman portrayals on film: Tobey Maguire, in Sam Raimi’s trilogy, Andrew Garfield in Marc Webb’s Duology and Tom Holland in two-solo Spider-Man films directed by Jon Watts and three crossover movies: Captain America: Civil War, Avengers: Infinity War & Avengers: Endgame, all directed by the Russo brothers. Technically, there is also the fourth (second within the MCU) Max Favreau, the son of Jon Favreau, who played a young child Tony Stark saved in Iron Man 2, later revealed to be Peter Parker. An admittedly enjoyable retcon, it bears little relevance to the events of the upcoming film. Still, it has always been a widely-accepted background detail by fans that ties into the MCU’s wider shared-universe storytelling. However, shared universe storytelling is now set to become shared multiverse storytelling, tying together events from multiple franchises and studios. The possibilities are vast, and for many fans, this will be a moment of huge-celebration, with Alfred Molina’s performance as Otto Octavius being widely celebrated within the sub-genre.
On a personal level, I could not be more excited. Alfred Molina is a wonderful talent, with immense skill in the subtle nuances and details that create beloved characters, and he will no doubt bring great dignity to this larger-than-life role once more. The biggest question is: Will he get the deserved screen time? With every new casting, every new detail, this film simultaneously grows more ambitious and more bloated. It is exciting and worrying in equal measure, with the chance to be a decade-defining blockbuster incredibly early into the 2020s. Alternatively, it could be one of its first biggest disappointments, consumed by its own weight, unable to give the best of its story enough time to breath under impossibly tight restrictions. It is clear in hindsight that Jon Watts has been subtly building to this thematically: His first outing with Tom Holland’s Spider-Man was a small-scale, homespun adventure with small-stakes and intimate character drama. His second was a continent-hopping, multi-nation epic, with global consequences hinting at wider impacts from the multiverse. However, this turned out to be a falsehood manipulated by the villain. Regardless, the stakes were significantly amped, and now, they’ve truly shot into the stratosphere, with multi-universe villains returning in such a way that will almost certainly require multiple Spider-Man to stop them. A setup like that is hard to resist yet harder to execute. Though I wish them all the best in the undertaking, even for a studio that routinely produces Avengers movies, this will most certainly be no simple task. Let’s hope that Jon Watts, Marvel, Tom Holland the multiverse extended cast are up to the challenge.
Marley Eleven Bury is a twenty-one year old Film & TV writer who loves takeaway and the superhero genre far too much. His claims to fame are having listened to the entire 26-hour+ Fire and Blood audiobook multiple times and being able to sing the Periodic Table song from memory.
