Warning: This article contains SPOILERS for Spider-Man: No Way Home
Spider-Man: No Way Home was released earlier this month to massive box office success. The multiversal mayhem and promise of closure for the previous Spider-Man franchises has continued to draw in fans. Cracking $1 billion after not even two weeks, No Way Home is the most successful film released during the Covid-19 pandemic and is on its way to becoming one of the highest-grossing films of all time.
No Way Home sees Tom Holland's Spidey team up with Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield's The Amazing Spider-Man franchises. When Holland's Peter is struggling after the death of Aunt May and is contemplating revenge on the Green Goblin, Maguire and Garfield arrive just in the nick of time to help the MCU's Peter grieve May and handle the villains responsibly. The three Spideys get a chance to work together to save the day, with both of the previous Spider-Men feeling authentic to the versions set up in their respective franchises.
For Maguire's Spider-Man, some of the key elements from his reprisal came from Maguire himself. In an interview with THR, screenwriters Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers explained how much of Parker's characterization was down to Maguire. When discussing the character, Maguire said that he wanted his Peter to be "very minimal," and to not give too much away about where his character was at now, or what had happened to him since his movies. Writers had already established that they had no interest in de-aging Maguire, so consideration had to be put into where his Peter would be at now, and that it was important for everyone not to go into the movie "spilling all the beans." Read their full comments below:
MCKENNA We were like, “We’ve got to make them each very specific.” As writers, we kept saying, “Where are these characters in their lives when they come into the movie?” Where is Tobey? We’re not de-agifying him. He’s a guy who is 43, who is entering this movie, and Andrew Garfield, where are they in their lives? The last time you saw Andrew Garfield, it was the death of Gwen, and that must have sent him down a dark spiral, maybe he never got out of. We don’t know, because there wasn’t a third movie that we saw. Where did he go? Maybe a really dark place. We wanted to be true to the characters in those movies. Really having conversations about specifying where they are, without giving away too much. Not coming in, spilling all the beans. “Tobey’s Peter is running Peter Parker Industries!” You just wanted to have little hints of that without it being all this exposition as fan service.
Did Tobey and Andrew give input on that?
MCKENNA Tobey wanted to be very minimal about how much you know. Very, very minimal. Andrew really loved the idea of he’s still tortured over what happened in Amazing Spider-Man 2 and where that left him, and how they could bring that to Tom. “We can empathize with you. We do know what you are going through. If anyone in the world knows what you’re going through, it’s us.” But also, “We can be beacons.” Tobey especially has come through that darkness. We thought it was cool that Andrew’s Peter was still in the midst of that darkness. They weren’t just here to go, “Two awesome Jedi knight heroes who show up and are going to help you take down the bad guys.” They are going through their own things. We were trying to write up to the characters that they did such a great job of creating and really being true to those characters and those stories and those worlds so that it didn’t feel like we were doing curtain call, fan-service.
Maguire's Peter enters No Way Home relaxed and knowledgeable, showing that he has obviously been in the superhero business for quite some time at the point he enters the MCU. Out of the three Spideys, Maguire's is the most collected and has a lot of insight to share with both Garfield and Holland's Peters, particularly in regards to helping Holland's Spider-Man move past his want for revenge against Green Goblin by sharing how he had walked the same road as a teenager after Uncle Ben's death. Although little is said about what Maguire's Peter is up to, what is said gives fans a lot of closure for the character, confirming that he and MJ are still together and were able to overcome their differences.
Keeping things minimal meant that potential follow-up appearances by Maguire and Garfield where extra information about their lives may become available.
Source: THR
