The fact that Marvel Studios have to share the rights to the character with Sony means that Spider-Man isn’t afforded the same sort of creative leeway as the vast majority of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s other superheroes, but that doesn’t mean that Tom Holland’s take on the iconic web-slinger isn’t set to be positioned as one of the franchise’s figureheads throughout Phase Four and beyond.
We’ve already heard that Marvel are planning on making at least six more Spider-Man movies, and with each stage of the shared universe being meticulously planned out in advance by Kevin Feige and his team, you can guarantee that they know exactly where Peter Parker is headed despite the upcoming third installment still being shrouded in mystery.
We don’t even know who the villain of Spider-Man 3 is yet, although Kraven the Hunter seems to be the frontrunner, but we’ve nonetheless heard today that the fourth adventure for the MCU’s friendly neighborhood wall-crawler could be set to introduce two of the most notorious figures from his extensive rogues’ gallery.
According to our intel – which comes from the same sources that told us Disney were working on live-action remakes of their animated classics Bambi and Robin Hood months before either was officially confirmed – the MCU’s Spider-Man 4 will feature Doctor Octopus and the Lizard, with the caveat that neither will become full-blown villains by the movie’s end.
Instead, Otto Octavius and Curt Connors will be established as supporting players and professors at Peter’s university, with an eye to building them up to assume their nefarious alter-egos in the future. Of course, we’ve already seen this attempted before in Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man franchise with Dylan Baker’s Dr. Connors, which must have been a real slap in the face for the actor when the Lizard turned out to be the reboot’s major antagonist.
It makes sense that Marvel would start planting seeds for future movies though given that previous villains Vulture and Mysterio both had their origin stories tied to Peter’s mentor Tony Stark, and with Iron Man now out of the picture, they can no longer rely on him to be the one responsible for every single threat Spider-Man is forced to come up against in the MCU.
