When we're going to get our first look at the Marvel Cinematic Universe's version of Spider-Man remains to be seen (it could be as soon as next week if some reports are to be believed), but Captain America: Civil War directors Joe and Anthony Russo refused to reveal whether we'll get any sort of official images before the release of that movie in May during a recent chat with ComicBook.com. They did however shed some light on what we should expect from their interpretation of Marvel's most iconic superhero, and it definitely sounds like they're taking things in a very different direction.
"We had thought back to the things that excited us about him as a character when we were younger, and one of the most important components of that was that he's a high schooler burdened with incredible powers and responsibility," explains Joe Russo. "That really differentiates him from every other character in the Marvel universe as opposed to other superheroes. For us, it was extremely important that we cast somebody very close to the age of a high school student. The previous films had adults playing a high schooler. We wanted more of an authenticity to the casting. We were very specific about that. We wanted an energy and charisma from the character, an energy, but also an insecurity that would make him fun to watch in contrast to the confident superheroes."
"It was also important to us that the actor that was cast feel contemporary because the other films that portrayed where he lived is more... they honored the comic books in terms of the choices," he continues. "But you go look at the home that Tobey Maguire lived in in Raimi’s Spider-Man was... those were very expensive homes. We wanted to relate it to the reality. A character growing up with his aunt in New York, a single income family… Where would they live? What would that look like? Where could they afford to live? We asked ourselves all those questions. We try to take a very logical and realistic and naturalistic approach to the character."
That all makes sense, especially as the comics typically portrayed Peter as coming from a hard working, but very poor background (pretty much everything he did as a youngster was to help his Aunt May pay the bills). Does this mean that we'll no longer see him and May living in a cushy house in Queens? It certainly sounds that way, and Anthony then went on to address how they're going about fitting this new version of Spider-Man into the MCU. "We're bringing Spider-Man into the movie in that universe, now, in that specific tonal stylistic world. I think underscoring everything Joe was saying about your question in terms of how were we thinking about the character in relation to past interpretations of the character, part of our choices were all so colored by the specifics of the world what we were playing in with these two Captain America movies, meaning Winter Soldier and Civil War. It's a very specific tonal world. It's a little more grounded and a little more hard-core contemporary. That was also coloring our choices a lot about the character on Spider-Man."
"We're not trying to denigrate other interpretations of Spider-Man," he adds. "Raimi's movies are fantastic. Spider-Man one and two are amazing. Two, is one of if not my favorite comic book movie of all time. But he made a very strong choice with those movies from a color palate standpoint to a costume standpoint, execution standpoint, camerawork standpoint to honor the feeling of the comic book. We're trying to honor the feeling of naturalism and to honor the feeling of reality. The harder we can pull these characters into reality, the better for us, especially because we're all so connected now through social media, the Internet. We're all so dialed in to what's happening in current events. That it's important for us that these characters live in the world that we live in because it makes them more real and it makes our experience of watching them more passionate and more well-rounded."
It defintly sounds like we're going to be getting a new take on Spider-Man then, but that may not be a bad thing, especially when you look at how well Marvel has updated other heroes so far. Weigh in with your thoughts on the comments in the usual place, and for more from the Russos, click on the link below.