Spider-Man: No Way Home Star Jacob Batalon Speaks Out on Ned Becoming the Hobgoblin

Fans of the Marvel Cinematic Universe love the bond between Ned Leeds and Peter Parker in the Spider-Man movies, especially because the real-life friendship between Jacob Batalon and Tom Holland makes it feel even more real. Their friendship brings a lot of joy to the screen, but longtime fans of Marvel Comics keep waiting for another shoe to drop. In the comics, Ned becomes the villainous Hobgoblin, and folks are wondering if the on-screen version of the character will ever follow the same story.

The topic of Hobgoblin has become a popular one for people to bring up with Batalon, as fans are now starting to look toward the future of the Spider-Man characters. During a recent interview with Variety, Batalon remained tight-lipped on the entire situation, not wanting to speak on anything that might be on the way for his character.

“From all my years of working for Marvel, I feel like I’ve learned to just not say anything,” Batalon said. “I can’t really speak on things and then say something that might actually be true and then I ruin something, you know what I mean?”

Unsurprisingly, Batalon isn’t able to say a whole lot about his future in the MCU. There are likely things he knows and isn’t allowed to spoil, but he also probably doesn’t know his character’s entire future trajectory at this point. The MCU evolves and changes as it goes, so many of the actors truly can’t talk about the future with a lot of certainty. 

What they can talk about, however, is the past. In the same interview, Batalon opened up about the secrets surrounding Spider-Man: No Way Home, and how he had to try and keep the reveals of Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire under wraps for a long time.

“I think it was just the scariness of ruining such a great surprise. We all understood it was such a momentous thing to happen in like, not just a superhero movie, but in cinema,” the actor said. “To actually do something that crazy is wild. We just wanted to make sure that we kept it as [quiet] as possible so everyone could genuinely be so surprised and love it.”

Do you want to see Batalon’s Ned become the Hobgoblin in the MCU? Let us know in the comments!