The announcement that Jamie Foxx would be returning as Electro was our first indicator that the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Spider-Man: No Way Home would be incorporating the multiverse into its narrative, and the actor was quick to reassure fans that he wouldn’t be blue this time.
From a critical and commercial perspective, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is the weakest live-action Spidey blockbuster we’ve ever seen, and Foxx came in for his fair share of criticism for a performance that veered a little too far into the hammy side of things, never mind the fact he looked like a Blue Man Group reject.
However, Max Dillon is back in No Way Home with a much better redesign, one that’s generated plenty of questions after it appears he’s being powered by a Stark Industries arc reactor. Speaking at the CCXP panel alongside Tom Holland and Willem Dafoe, the Academy Award winner hyped his new and improved Electro.
“I was excited knowing [producer] Amy [Pascal] for years, man, and knowing what she’s done with this franchise, and she was explaining to me that it’s gonna be hot, and I didn’t have to be blue, and things like that as far as my character is concerned, so you’re gonna be a little more hip, and that I get a chance to hang out with these incredible thespians. To walk on set and to see these guys, I literally bowed to them, and we’ve been having a ball. I’m happy we got a brand new start, a brand new look.
The blue, when we did it the first time, I didn’t care, I was just happy to be in this wonderful course, and it was, like you said, it was sort of like two or three hours or whatever. But with this new, this new new, it’s fly. The homies are like ‘Ok, we get you now.’ I was blue, they still roll with me, ‘Ok, you blue.’ But this one, it just feels more comfortable, and I think it feels more today, modern, not trying so hard. I sort of relate it to R&B. Back in the day, R&B, you used to have fringes on your outfit and shoulder pads and things. Now, you can just sing, so it’s like, now we’re just singing.”
We’re less than two weeks away from Spider-Man: No Way Home coming to theaters at long last, and while the specifics are being kept under wraps, everyone’s fully expecting a battle for the ages between a trio of Peter Parkers and at least five multiversal villains, which has the potential to be one of the best third act showdowns the superhero genre has ever had to offer.