In an attempt to recover his recently spoiled anonymity, Peter Parker asks fellow Avenger Doctor Strange to cast a spell, one that will cause “the entire world to forget that Peter Parker is Spider-Man.” It gets botched, however, and significant foes from other Spider-Man universes begin to flood in through the breach in space-time.
According to the latest Spider-Man: No Way Home trailer, it’s a veritable who’s who of villains: Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe), Doctor Octopus (Alfred Molina) and Sandman (Thomas Haden Church) from the Spider-Man trilogy; Lizard (Rhys Ifans) and Electro (Jamie Foxx) from The Amazing Spider-Man movies.
Even space-time savant Doctor Strange admits that “the multiverse is a concept about which we know frighteningly little.” So … what if it could stretch beyond the world of Peter Parker? Beyond even the Marvel Cinematic Universe? There’s no harm in imagining, so bear with us as we dream up our own fantasy league of supervillains. We still think Spider-Man could take them—but it might be a close call.
Spider-Man: No Way Home is now playing in theaters everywhere.
This Oscar-winning animated movie featured the first female Doc Ock: scientist Dr. Olivia Octavius, voiced charismatically by Kathryn Hahn. As Miles Morales learned in Spider-Verse, Octavius has a strong (and lethal) interest in parallel universes, so we wouldn’t be surprised to see her show up in Tom Holland’s world—except for the fact that hers is animated and his is live-action. That would be quite the crossover, especially if additional web slingers like Spider-Man Noir, Peni Parker or Spider-Ham drop in to liven things up.
Although revenge against King T’Challah was this Navy SEAL’s main preoccupation, we can imagine a scenario in which Killmonger (played by Michael B. Jordan) finds a motive to wreak havoc on Spider-Man’s world—perhaps to make a claim for the throne of a new domain: New York City. With the muscles and the nanotech suit, he’d make quite the menacing nemesis for Peter Parker.
We’re hoping that Peter’s love for MJ could withstand botanist-gone-bad Poison Ivy’s (Uma Thurman) seductive and mind-controlling pheromones—and prevent him from getting too close to her deadly kiss. But in case they ever do cross paths … he might take a page from Robin’s book and come prepared with a pair of protective rubber lips.
It’s not always about laboratory-induced superpowers. Sometimes folks are just plain smart … smart and evil. That’s the case for supergenius Mr. Glass (Samuel L. Jackson), who became fixated on comic book superheroes as a young child. Now he hunts heroes down in real life, collecting them like baseball cards, and we just know he’d think Spider-Man would be a great addition to the collection …
While the Tom Holland series has never been short on laughs (we’re looking at you, Jacob Batalon), it might be refreshing for a villain to be a main source of comic relief, much like Gene Hackman’s Lex Luthor was in Superman: The Movie. The real estate guru, whose greed is insatiable, would have a field day in New York City.