Marvel Studios and Sony Pictures‘ Spider-Man: Homecoming scored an estimated $117 million domestically and a five-day global total of $257 million this weekend. That means a lot of people saw the film, obviously, and they have a few questions regarding a certain Homecoming reveal involving Zendaya, as well as the film’s mid-credits scene, both of which director Jon Watts and producers Kevin Feige and Amy Pascal have now addressed. Spoilers ahead!
First up is Watts talking to Entertainment Weekly about the mid-credits scene involving Toomes/Vulture (Michael Keaton) in prison, choosing not to reveal Peter Parker’s secret identity to a fellow inmate. While some have perceived it as Toomes wanting to save the revenge for himself, Watts said it’s not an evil moment at all.
“He gets a moment of redemption and he gets to protect Peter, even though Peter would never know,” says Watts. “It’s his way of saying thank you. You couldn’t just rely on the tropes of the villain being a murderer and killing a bunch of people. He had to be redeemable in some capacity in the end and that he believes everything he said, especially about his family. So it was a really fine walk to create a villain that still has that moment of redemption in the end. Those scenes with [Toomes] and Peter in the house, where he’s driving Peter to the dance — that right there is the reason for doing the movie. That, more than anything else, is what I was looking forward to, and I got to have a lot of fun shooting that stuff.”
As for whether Vulture could strap the wings back on, either to wreck more havoc or to aid Peter in some way, Watts has an answer.
“Toomes definitely could come back,” Watts adds.
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Perhaps the most hotly debated Homecoming reveal comes just before the end of the movie as the character Michelle (Zendaya) says her friends all call her MJ. This has a lot of fans thinking the filmmakers did a fake-out by calling the character “Michelle” when she’s actually Mary Jane Watson, but producers Kevin Feige and Amy Pascal told IGN that’s simply not the case.
“We never even looked at it as a big reveal necessarily but more of just a fun homage to his past adventures and his past love,” Feige explains. “She’s not Mary Jane Watson. She never was Mary Jane Watson. She was always this new high school character, Michelle, who we know there’s an “M” in Michelle and an “M” in Mary. [laughs] So we’re so clever and we thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be neat if her initials were MJ?’ And then I think it leaked that she would be playing MJ and then it became a whole headache for Zendaya to have to navigate. It was never a big, ‘Oh my God, it’s a big reveal!’ There are big reveals in the movie. That’s not one of them. She’s not Mary-Jane Watson. Is she going to date Peter? Are they going to fall in love? She seems to be intrigued with him. There’s a nice chemistry there. Who knows what will happen in the future films?”
If that wasn’t enough to convince you Zendaya is not Mary Jane, Pascal is even more blunt…
“She is not going to end as being Mary Jane Watson,” Pascal said.
Directed by Jon Watts, Spider-Man: Homecoming stars Tom Holland, Michael Keaton, Zendaya, Donald Glover, Jacob Batalon, Laura Harrier, Tony Revolori, Tyne Daly, Bokeem Woodbine, with Marisa Tomei and Robert Downey Jr.
A young Peter Parker / Spider-Man (Tom Holland), who made his sensational debut in Captain America: Civil War, begins to navigate his newfound identity as the web-slinging super hero in Spider-Man: Homecoming. Thrilled by his experience with the Avengers, Peter returns home, where he lives with his Aunt May (Marisa Tomei), under the watchful eye of his new mentor Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr.). Peter tries to fall back into his normal daily routine – distracted by thoughts of proving himself to be more than just your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man – but when the Vulture (Keaton) emerges as a new villain, everything that Peter holds most important will be threatened.
Spider-Man: Homecoming was written by Jonathan Goldstein & John Francis Daley, Jon Watts & Christopher Ford, and Chris McKenna & Erik Sommers. The film is produced by Kevin Feige and Amy Pascal, and executive produced by Louis D’Esposito, Victoria Alonso, Patricia Whitcher, Jeremy Latcham, and Stan Lee.
A Spider-Man: Homecoming sequel is already scheduled for July 5, 2019 and Tom Holland recently confirmed a third film is also in the works
