Hope is a beautiful thing. For Spider-Man fans, hope is what kept them going through the horrors of Spider-Man 3 and its dancing goth Peter Parker, the mediocrity of the Amazing Spider-Man reboot, and Sony‘s endless back-and-forth as they desperately tried to work out what to do with the franchise.
Mostly, Spider-Man fans hoped that Marvel would swoop in and save the day, because while the Amazing Spider-Man movies are okay, Marvel Studios has the Avengers, while Sony keeps coming up with weird ideas like a Sinister Six spinoff.
The good news is, all that hoping and waiting has finally paid off. Sony and Marvel have worked out a crossover deal where Spider-Man will appear in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, most likely in Captain America: Civil War. This news inspired a near-religious fervor among Marvel aficionados, many of whom are treating it more like the second coming than what it actually is: a corporate merger.
Marvel never needed Sony, Marvel just wanted to give us what us fans have always dreamed of. Because Marvel is love… Marvel is life.
— ComicBook NOW! (@ComicBookNOW) February 10, 2015
Anyway, now that we’ve got that first flush of excitement out of the way, it’s time to get down to the nitty-gritty of baseless casting speculation. And what better place to start than everyone’s first choice of Spider-Man, Tobey Maguire?
Wait, what?
I hope they bring back Tobey Maguire as Spider-Man. #AvengersMeetSpiderman
— Sam (@_lawhd) February 10, 2015
As it turns out, a surprising number of people want to see the 39-year-old actor return to the role. And sure, some of them are kidding, but even more seem to be deadly serious.
https://twitter.com/joewilson90/status/565091165838790657
Cannot believe Spider-Man is finally getting the chance to cross over into the Marvel Universe. Now just bring back Tobey Maguire. #Huge
— Johno M (@JPcookies) February 10, 2015
Bruh!!! He'll always be spiderman idc RT @ron_gam: Amazing spiderman sucks… Bring back Tobey Maguire
— Blaze of the Hill (@Worldwide_Blaze) January 26, 2015
Hope they skip the origin story and just bring back tobey maguire as spiderman #Spidey #Marvel
— Joe winders (@Joewinders) February 10, 2015
https://twitter.com/chenhealy/status/565026524156280832
https://twitter.com/MayorMillz/status/565052213073305600
While we are not an oracle imbued with the power to predict Marvel’s decisions, it feels safe to say that they will not be bringing back Tobey Maguire. That is not a thing that will happen in the real world. Although there is one instance in which we could get behind this idea, and that’s a movie where Tobey Maguire plays a middle-aged mentor figure to Miles Morales.
https://twitter.com/Parkour3012/status/565091738327728128
However, that is also not going to happen. The Marvel–Sony agreement makes it slightly more likely that Miles Morales will appear at some point, but unfortunately, we doubt that he’s going to be the lead character.
Marvel’s announcement implied that a new actor would be cast, saying “the new Spider-Man will first appear in a Marvel film” before appearing in the next installment of Sony’s franchise. Whether that Sony film will be a sequel or another reboot is unclear, but either way, it won’t star Tobey Maguire.
Photo via Sony Pictures