In Invincible season 2's finale, Mark Grayson is sent hurtling through the Multiverse and encounters a wall-crawling superhero called Agent Spider. Fans of the comics will know that Invincible and Spider-Man once crossed paths on the page, but making that happen in a film or TV show is easier said than done.
Talking to Variety (via Toonado.com), creator and executive producer Robert Kirkman was asked about bringing Josh Keaton back to lend his voice to an alternate version of Spider-Man who, well, isn't Spider-Man...but kind of is!
"It was just trying to figure out a way to keep that moment somewhat intact from the comics," he explains. "It seemed like something that would be a fun and surprising way to do it. Amazon legal, painstakingly, was like, 'No, the costume can’t be that color. We gotta get away from this and that.' There were a lot of eyes on that scene."
"We wanted to find an actor who had done Spider-Man before. [Supervising director] Dan Duncan came in immediately and was like, 'Josh Keaton needs to do it. 'Spectacular Spider Man' is a great series.' He had worked on it and said Josh was great. He seemed like the best possible choice because it’s animation to animation. It seemed like it would be a fun thing."
"That said, he’s not playing Spider-Man. That’s Agent Spider," Kirkman reiterated. "There might be some similarities, but I think Josh’s nuanced performance as Agent Spider is completely different than the way he played Spider-Man in 'Spectacular Spider-Man.' But who knows? My opinion may be somewhat biased."
As for whether Prime Video ever reached out to Marvel's lawyers about seeing what would and wouldn't be possible, it sounds like they knew from the start that Spider-Man himself was off the table. As a result, it all became about not getting on the House of Mouse's bad side.
"No, I mean, I’m pretty sure Marvel found out about it today," Kirkman confesses. "So, we didn’t call any Marvel lawyers or anything. No, that was Amazon’s legal department’s job to make sure that Marvel didn’t need to know."
Keaton himself has also broken his silence on his Agent Spider cameo. Check out what he had to say in the X posts below.