[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”21629″ img_size=”800×345″ alignment=”center”][vc_column_text]Spider-Man: Far From Home’s latest trailer really blew us away. From making us all feel as sad as Peter Parker in the aftermath of Tony Stark’s death, to the laughs we got from Happy’s disgruntled stance on Parker ghosting Nick Fury, to absolutely being in awe over Jake Gyllenhaal’s Mysterio, this looks like a great film. The trailer also has opened the door up for discussion, as not only do we have the introduction of Mysterio and the Elementals, but the possibility of a multiverse and the fan-theory that this could all be an illusion by a certain character. Slash Film did a great job in breaking down everything there is to know about the upcoming Spidey film after speaking with executive Producer Eric Hauserman Caroll, so we are going to summarize what the news outlet found out for us fans.
The Villains
As mentioned before, we are going to see the Elementals create a mess for Spidey. Those creatures are Water, Fire, Earth, and Ice. They’re reinterpretations of characters from the comic books. It was formally mentioned that we’d see b-listed villains like Hydro-Man show up; in reality; it was simply an Elemental. Executive producer Eric Hauserman Carroll explained:
“When we took a step back and started talking about the characters we wanted to bring to the big screen this time around, we decided that there were two levels of Spider-Man villain. The trademark of a great Spider-Man villain is his relationship to that villain. He has to have some deeply personal connection to that character, whether it’s the Osborns and being best friends, whether it’s what we did with Vulture in the last movie, we think that’s what makes one of these marquee Spider-Man villains. But there’s this other subset of Spider-Man villains that are awesome and we’d love to bring to the big screen, but it seems like maybe a whole movie about Hydro Man might not be the way to go.”
He then continued, in regards to “Molten Man”, who we see is a Fire Elemental:
“[Spidey] can’t web this guy. He can’t punch this guy. So how does he beat this guy? He has to use his real superpower, which is his genius-level intellect. So we thought that was a really fun ‘in’ here, to take these characters that keep putting Spider-Man in interesting positions where we guarantee ourselves it’s not going to be just two guys punching each other until one guy passes out. The idea of bringing these four Elemental creatures together is something we got excited about, and we get to play with these characters who would probably never get brought to the big screen in any other way.”
Stealth Suit
Obviously, we’ve all seen the stealth suit, and we’re all pretty pumped about getting a better look in the second trailer than we did the first one. Carroll goes into the briefing Parker has with Nick Fury, as we see being put into voicemail won’t stop Fury:
“Peter Parker pulls Nick aside and says, ‘Listen man, I really want to help. It sounds like you’re really up against it. But there’s gotta be somebody else you can call, and besides, last time I went on a field trip, Spider-Man showed up and saved the day. Don’t you think somebody’s going to connect the dots? My secret identity is important to me. If this guy shows up, saves the day, somebody’s going to do the math. I really want to help you, but it seems like you’ve got everyone you need anyway, so if you don’t mind…’ and Nick Fury is like, ‘I totally understand.’ He’s like, ‘You do? That’s great!’ So he thinks he’s off the hook and he takes off.”
“It’s inspired by a bunch of different looks in the comics,” Carroll says. “We have Noir, we have Big Time, but when [Marvel Studios’ head of visual development] Ryan Meinerding was designing this, he had all of those past S.H.I.E.L.D. agents in mind, so it’s very reminiscent of what Black Widow or Hawkeye would wear. It’s got amazing little details. This would be the patch where there would be a S.H.I.E.L.D. logo if S.H.I.E.L.D. were still a thing, stuff like that. This is supposed to be a really tactical version of the suit. It doesn’t have all of the bells and whistles of the suit Tony gave him. But that’s OK, it allows him to operate in Europe without everyone just assuming Spider-Man’s on the scene.”
“The one thing he asks for them to keep were his goggles, because they help him focus his heightened senses,” Carroll continues. “Because it’s Spider-Man and we thought this was so cool, Jon Watts really wanted to find a way to make it less cool, so he gave him these cheesy flip-up versions of the Spider-Man goggles, like those ‘80s glasses. He has to operate them manually, there’s no cool mechanism. It’s so funny because we sent the design off to costumes and props, and of course the first design they sent us was awesome, like an Iron Man helmet. We’re like, ‘No, that’s the point – dumber. It’s gotta look really dumb when he flips it up.’ So we have a lot of fun with that, where he’s talking to really imposing-looking characters and has to flip this up to talk to them.”
As far as for how much of the movie we see him in the stealth suit, Caroll elaborated:
“He [Peter] is given it not long after he crosses paths with the Water Elemental, and he wears it right up until the third act of the movie. By that point, allegiances have shifted and so on, so maybe he’s decided he doesn’t want to wear Nick Fury’s costume anymore. But it is a big part of the movie and it is what he’s wearing for more or less the entire second act of the movie.”
Obviously, a big part of Parker’s characterization is him realizing how much he likes MJ, and it seems in this movie he is trying to find a way to muster up the ability to tell her about how he feels. Unfortunately, Peter has competition with Brad, a character played by Remy Hii. Carroll explains:
“He is the kind of guy that guys like me and Peter hated in high school, because their hair always looked [great], their clothes always fit the way they were supposed to, he always had something funny to say and he’s read all the same books as MJ – or at least he lies and says he’s read all the same books as MJ. We wanted to keep that high school soap opera thing alive in this movie, because if you really look back at old Spider-Man comics, that side of it is really as important as the superhero. It was this winning combination of taking what people loved about Archie and throwing it into a superhero comic. We wanted to keep that alive and introducing the character of Brad is a fun way to do that. Again, he’s not the stereotypical bully, but he is an obstacle. He’s not mean-spirited, he doesn’t pick on Peter or shove him in lockers. He just happens to make the girl that Peter likes laugh a lot, which makes Peter uncomfortable.”
Peter still has some growing up to do and it doesn’t matter that he’s saved the world, he still has to contend with Brad:
“Basically, he tries to make Brad look bad and almost blows up his bus by launching some weaponized drones that the spy team has access to. At the end of the day, it’s always about saving people and doing the right thing,” Tom Holland tells us during a break from shooting. “The world is at risk in this film. I feel like The Vulture was sort of low-level crime, it was under the radar, not many people knew about it. But this is a worldwide event. So the stakes are much higher for [Peter], and he understands that, meaning he has to really show up and bring his A game. But at the heart of the film, Peter Parker just wants to tell the girl he really likes that he loves her and have a nice holiday. But that all gets ruined. Brad gets in the way.” – Caroll states.
Caroll then moved into the Nick Fury and Spider-Man relationship, explaining how one of his first premises for this movie was to get the two in the same room together. According to Caroll, Fury is the “mean new stepdad”, which goes along with the theme for Spider-Man. Tony was meant as a father figure and Quentin Beck (Mysterio) has been described as the “new uncle”.
“One of the things that is a timeless theme in these coming of age movies is why do adults operate in the grey?” Carroll elaborates. “Spider-Man’s like, ‘This is easy. Let’s just do the right thing!’ Or ‘Let’s just tell people what’s going on, and everything will be OK!’ and Nick Fury’s like, ‘That’s not how the world works, kid.’ So he just gets wrapped up in this spy adventure being driven by Nick Fury and sort of feeling more and more caught in the middle between how he wants to operate and how he’s been told he should operate.”
Mysterio
Let’s get into one of the biggest aspects buzzing about this upcoming movie – Gyllenhaal as Mysterio. In the comics, Mysterio is a long-running villain of Spider-Man and a master of illusions. The movie, though; has been very adamant in presenting him as a good guy and an ally working with Fury. At no point has any of the marketing or promos attempted to reveal anything to the contrary, although fans speculate this is all to trick the viewers and Spider-Man, so to make it even more intense when it’s finally revealed that Mysterio’s true intentions are villainous?
Carroll explains:
“He’s got a mystical slant in this one. That’s why he is on the team. He’s got a working history with these Elementals, and his power is tied to something similar.”
Lastly, despite reports that Michael Keaton would reprise his role as the Vulture, this is not true:
“He’s not [in the film]. We literally don’t know where that came from. It showed up on IMDb one day and I was like, ‘What is this? Does anyone know what this is about?’ I think [someone] showed me the article, and he’s like, ‘Everyone on the internet is talking about how he’s in the movie right now.’ We don’t know how that rumor started. We adored Michael Keaton’s take on the character and definitely kept him in mind when we were writing it, but once we went down this path, all our ideas to include him started to feel like, ‘Are they just shoehorning him in because he’s a great actor and wanted to work with him one more time?’…We [also] teased the Scorpion [in Homecoming’s post-credits scene]. He is not in this movie. Nor is Michael Mando.”
How do you feel about the Vulture and the Scorpion not being in the movie despite the set up in Homecoming’s post-credit scene? And what do you think about Far From home, which will hit theaters on July 2nd?[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]
A girl with too many fandoms to count.
