Spider-Man: Far From Home featured what many consider to be the Marvel Cinematic Universe's best post-credits scene, as J.K. Simmons reprised the role of J. Jonah Jameson to reveal the web-slinger's secret identity to the world. It was a moment no one saw coming, and not even the so-called "scoopers" online had caught wind of Marvel Studios' plans to bring the actor back as The Daily Bugle E-I-C.
Talking to Den Of Geek about his role in Amazon's The Tomorrow War, Simmons opened up about returning as Jameson and what it means to him to be able to revisit and reinterpret the character.
"Those movies with Sam [Raimi] will always be big highlights of my career and my life," the actor said of the original Spider-Man trilogy. "Sam is one of my favorite directors and human beings."
"To have the opportunity to kind of do a reboot of the character, I was eager to hang on to the things I really loved about it and totally open to letting go of some of that, and realizing we are in a more updated version of that universe. Hopefully, we found the sweet spot there."
As for what the biggest change was, Simmons jokes: "Mostly just the hair, or the lack thereof. For a lot of characters, that evolution is a really important aspect. I like the lack of evolution of that character. There are ways that he’s evolved, but he’s the same blowhard and that’s what I enjoy doing."
There have been rumours that Simmons will return as Jonah in SPUMC movies like Venom: Let There Be Carnage and Morbius, but it's hard not to hope that he remains "exclusive" to the MCU in Spider-Man: No Way Home and beyond. Then again, his presence could be a nice piece of connective tissue between the two different worlds it seems the wall-crawler will be swinging between.
What are your hopes for JJJ in the MCU and beyond?