So far, the various Spider-Man franchises don’t have the best track record when it comes to handling villains. Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 3 cracked under the weight of studio pressure and an overstuffed plot, while The Amazing Spider-Man 2‘s desire to build and expand a shared universe at the expense of the film’s narrative ended up killing the series completely, with the various supporting characters and Easter Eggs hinting at the Sinister Six ultimately being all for nothing.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe’s rebooted web-slinger has so far avoided those pitfalls by relying on a single villain per movie, and it helped that Michael Keaton and Jake Gyllenhaal are both fantastic actors that delivered great performances as Vulture and Mysterio, respectively, two bad guys that could have turned out painfully one dimensional in the wrong hands.
Kraven the Hunter was widely expected to be the main big bad in the MCU’s Spider-Man 3, but then the news broke that Jamie Foxx would be reprising his role as Electro from The Amazing Spider-Man 2 in a most unexpected development. The actor’s casting is certainly exciting and promises a formidable threat for Spidey to go up against, but we’ve now heard from our sources – the same ones that told us Taskmaster would be the villain in Black Widow – that Kraven will still factor into the hero’s third solo outing.
According to our intel, the cross-pollination between the MCU and the SPUoMC will continue as the big-game hunter is set to appear in Spider-Man 3, while Michael Mando’s Mac Gargan will also return and finally assume the mantle of Scorpion. Electro will most likely be positioned as the main villain, but Kevin Feige doesn’t want a simple rehash of a bad guy that audiences have already seen and didn’t particularly care for. As such, Tom Holland’s Peter Parker will end up facing multiple adversaries.
