Warning: This article contains spoilers for Spider-Man: No Way Home.
Venom: Let There Be Carnage‘s post-credits scene teed up a face-off between Tom Hardy’s Eddie Brock and Tom Holland’s Peter Parker as the symbiote was transported over to the MCU. If you were expecting this to play out in Spider-Man: No Way Home, though, you were sorely disappointed, as the threequel skips over this potential crossover. That said, a new theory suggests it may have set up a different Spidey/Venom battle in its place.
Full Spider-Man: No Way Home spoilers to follow.
As per The Direct, this theory ponders if there might be more significance to an exchange from the movie than meets the eye. So, yes, Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield return for No Way Home. In one scene in which the trio of webheads swap notes, Holland and Maguire bond over fighting aliens (Thanos and Venom, respectively). Garfield is bummed to be the odd one out and says “I want to fight an alien.” Well, maybe his wish will be granted.
Bucking expectations, NWH‘s post-credits sequence then catches up with Brock and Venom as they are sent back to their own universe, bringing their time in the MCU to a surprisingly brief end. So if this closes the door on a meet-up with Holland’s version, then maybe it’s setting up a battle with Garfield instead? The Morbius trailer has confirmed some links with the Amazing Spider-Man films, indicating that the Sony-verse universe is the same as the TASM one.
With there being more and more demand for The Amazing Spider-Man 3 or some kind of Garfield-led project on social media, it’s possible that these scenes were Marvel and Sony planting the seeds for an alternate Spidey vs. Venom event to the one we were expecting, but one that would be just as — if not even more — pleasing for fans.