During his 50-plus years as perhaps the world’s most popular superhero character, Spider-Man has been Peter Parker. And Peter Parker has been white. But could that change with the next Spider-Man movie?
When Sony and Marvel announced they were sharing the property in upcoming Marvel projects (such as May 2016’s Captain America: Civil War) and a new standalone Spidey film, many movie bloggers and scoop hounds endorsed the idea of Spider-Man adopting changes that the character has undergone in recent Marvel Comics.
In 2000, Marvel created the “Ultimate” line of comic books, which allowed the company to reboot its signature characters and modernize their origins. (The Ultimate books have been a heavy influence on the Marvel Studios films. For instance, Nick Fury is white in the regular comics, while in the Ultimate universe, he’s black, as you’ve seen in the movies with Samuel L. Jackson.)
However, those comics existed alongside the regular line of titles that were already being published. So essentially, you had two different versions of Spider-Man on the shelves: One that was more adult, and a revamped incarnation that was in high school. While that might seem confusing — especially if you were walking into a comic-book shop for the first time looking for Spider-Man books — readers now had more choices as to which version of the character they chose to follow. And creators had more options with what sorts of stories to tell.
That included creating an entirely new version of Spider-Man in 2011, when writer Brian Michael Bendis killed off Peter Parker in the Ultimate comic books and replaced him with an African-American character, Miles Morales. Bendis was inspired by a fan campaign for actor-musician Donald Glover to be cast as Spider-Man in Sony’s movie reboot.
Glover pushed for getting an audition for the role Spider-Man with kind of a wink and a smile, and fans raised the idea in the first place. But it raised a very good question: Why couldn’t Spider-Man/Peter Parker be played by a black actor? Was there really any reason he had to be white, just because that’s what he’d always been in the comic books? As a nod to the #Donald4Spiderman meme, Glover appeared on an episode of Community wearing Spider-Man pajamas and that inspired Bendis to create an African-American Spider-Man.
“He looked fantastic!” Bendis told USA Today‘s Brian Truitt. “I saw him in the costume and thought, ‘I would like to read that book.’ So I was glad I was writing that book.”
The Miles Morales version of Spider-Man has been extremely popular with comic book fans, which has surely emboldened Sony and Marvel to consider the possibility of introducing that character in the movies. Or perhaps the studios could have it both ways. Instead of using Morales, is there any reason that Peter Parker couldn’t be re-introduced to movie audiences as a black person?
Those possibilities are apparently being discussed, as was revealed on the Meet the Movie Press web show and podcast last Friday (Feb. 20). During the show, Variety reporter Justin Kroll mentioned that Sony and Marvel were looking for a “fresh start” for Spider-Man after the last two films (starring Andrew Garfield and directed by Marc Webb) were widely viewed as failures.
That prompted co-host Jeff Sneider, reporter for The Wrap, to reveal what he’s been hearing from people he’s talked to recently.
“This is not set in stone, guys, but I’m telling you right now, Spider-Man is not going to be white,” Sneider said. “I’m 95 percent sure. Spider-Man’s going to be most likely black. But there’s a chance he could also be Latino. 95 percent sure, not white.”
You can listen for yourself, beginning at the 44:30 mark of the Meet the Movie Press show.
Following the Sony-Marvel announcement, I was surprised at how many movie bloggers and writers suggested using the Miles Morales character in the next Spider-Man films. Though I certainly understood where so many of them were coming from. Let’s see something new and exciting. Do we really want to sit through another reboot of the character, in which we see Peter Parker being bitten by that radioactive spider again and deciding to use his superhuman abilities responsibly after his Uncle Ben is killed?
Part of the reason 2012’s The Amazing Spider-Man felt underwhelming is because we’d seen so much of the same story just 10 years earlier in Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man. Even if directors and screenwriters put different twists on the character, making him more edgy or whatever, it’s going to feel like a rehash if that origin story is told yet again — even if it’s with a new, young (white) actor. We know how Peter Parker became Spider-Man. Just tell a new Spider-Man story.
But how about telling a really new Spider-Man story? And if Sony and Marvel really want to attract attention for yet another version of the superhero, what would draw more headlines than reinventing that character as a black person? (Or Latino. Morales happens to be both, with an African-American father and Puerto Rican mother.) What better way to show audiences that this is a truly new take on Spider-Man, one worth your time, attention and money? What better way to attract new fans, reaching out to parts of the population who now see themselves represented on screen?
Unfortunately, certain contingents of comic book and superhero movie fans have not proven themselves to be the most enlightened people. We saw that when Michael B. Jordan (who would’ve been a great choice for a new Spider-Man) was cast as Johnny Storm in the upcoming Fantastic Four movie.
Yet there are also those who would rather see original black characters (such as Black Panther, Luke Cage and Cyborg) get a chance, rather than having white characters changed for what could be viewed as publicity-seeking and politically correct reasons. That, to me, is a far more defensible opinion than “But Peter Parker has always been white!” or “A black Spider-Man is not the character I read as a kid!”
It’s not like that version of the character is going to disappear. The comic books that have been around for 50 years are still around to read at any time. The movies starring Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield are widely available to be watched. As with the Marvel Comics, people would have a choice as to which version of the character to follow.
Obviously, big-budget superhero blockbusters are far more expensive to produce than comic books, so there is considerable risk for Sony and Marvel in potentially alienating the audience. But I think audiences are sophisticated enough now and familiar with superhero and comic book tropes to accept that different versions of a character or story can exist. They won’t be confused. And any such risk would be mitigated by tapping into a new audience discovering Spider-Man for the first time, as well as those ready to embrace something new and different.
Based on the success of its films, Marvel knows its audience far better than Sony. On its own, Sony might not make such a radical decision. But Marvel apparently senses that the time is right and superhero movie fans are ready for a truly new Spider-Man, whether it’s Miles Morales or a black Peter Parker. I would love to see this, and I don’t think I’m in the minority here.
