The newest trailer for the next highly anticipated Marvel Cinematic Universe installation, Spider-Man: No Way Home, dropped on November 16 and left fans with a lot of questions about what they did and didn’t reveal. The first trailer showed Peter Parker asking Doctor Strange to cast a spell that would make him forget that he’s Spider-Man. Doctor Strange agrees, but, in doing so, has broken their universe and allowed the multiverse to enter their world.
The newest trailer gives us a bit more of a glimpse into the consequences of their actions, as we’re introduced to many of the Spider-Man villains from different Spider-Man film universes like Doctor Octopus, Sandman, The Green Goblin, Electro, and The Lizard. It’s very clear that Marvel wanted this trailer to be about the villains. However, the biggest question from fans since the announcement of the film still remains; if Spider-Man villains from other movies are in the multiverse, doesn’t that mean that other Spider-Mans (or would it be Spider-Men?) are in the multiverse too? Marvel Studios and much of the cast of the film, including Tom Holland, have denied the involvement of the previous Spider-Man actors Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield. But they haven’t been able to stop the rumors. I, personally, am hesitant to get my hopes up until anything is confirmed, but I can never seem to get this thought out of my mind either.
The trailer ends on a cliffhanger, with the final quote spoken by Doctor Strange; “They are starting to come through and I can’t stop them.” Who are “they”? Where are they coming from? Are they heroes or villains from other universes? Are they characters we’ve already met? Another important question raised is whether or not we can believe that Doctor Strange and Peter’s spell was the inciting incident that set off the multiverse. Marvel Studios’s recent TV shows like WandaVision and Loki have introduced the idea, but are we meant to believe that they were introducing the idea so that we could see it played out in Spider-Man’s movie? As a part of the film’s promotion, it was also recently announced that tickets for No Way Home would go on sale on November 29 on what they were calling Spider Monday (their clever spin on Cyber Monday). Early Monday morning, ticket sites crashed and online queues formed. But, on its first day of presales, the film surpassed Black Widow for Fandango’s record for Marvel’s first-day advance ticket sales of 2021. The MCU’s previous Spider-Man installment, Spider-Man: Far From Home grossed $1.13 billion worldwide and was the fourth-highest-grossing film of 2019 and the 25th-highest-grossing film of all time. Projections for No Way Home are looking to be in a similar realm and better, expected to land in the top five openings of December of all-time. I, for one, have been looking forward to the release of this film for a long time and I can’t wait to see what predictions are proven true.