It's clear What If...? is going to take us to some crazy places, and in one alternate reality, Peter Parker will don Doctor Strange's Cloak of Levitation and become "Zombie Hunter Spidey."
During a recent interview with Post-Credit Podcast, Head Writer A.C. Bradley talked more about the wall-crawler's role in the series, and confirmed that there was one idea Marvel Studios was quick to shoot down: Spider-Man transforming into a literal spider.
"There was a couple of episodes that were just a little too dark. There was an original What If...? [comic] run I believe where Spider-Man turns into a real spider, and that was just too dark and too body horror for their PG-13," she confirmed. "But it was a blast! You said it yourself, we were basically given the keys to the toy store. 'Go have fun and make sure everything was different. Don't give us ten of the same, give us ten of the most different stories you can come up with.'"
In the comic books and Spider-Man: The Animated Series, Peter Parker becomes Man-Spider when his powers evolved beyond his control. However, it's likely Bradley is referring to the What If...? issue based on "The Other" storyline that again featured a twisted transformation for the wall-crawler.
Bradley concluded by adding, "It was less about being reeled back in from crazier stories. It was more of them stopping us from walking into one of the movies and destroying that."
Marvel Studios has yet to explore Spider-Man's origin story on the big screen, and while we know he was bitten by a spider, the circumstances surrounding that encounter haven't been elaborated on. Had this been a twisted take on that, it could have finally cleared things up (to a point), but it clearly wasn't meant to be.
Check back here later for our spoiler-free review of the first three episodes of What If...?
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