Marvel Meme Blames the Soul Stone for Getting X-Men and Fantastic Four, But Losing Spider-Man

Spider-Man fans have had one bummer of a start to the week with the news that their favorite hero might not see action in the Marvel Cinematic Universe anymore. One amusing Reddit meme captures the seesaw of emotions that comic book movie fans have felt over the last month or so. For everything that Marvel has gained this summer, losing Spider-Man would be a blow at this point.

In the meme, Thanos is pictured from when he had just claimed the Soul Stone in Avengers: Infinity War. He wakes up in the ocean of Vormir and looks around to find the stone in his hand. The Mad Titan can’t even be happy about his victory at this moment, because he had to give up so much to obtain another piece to achieve his goal. Marvel brass may feel the same after they got control of the X-Men and Fantastic Four, but lost Spider-Man for the time being.

Online, Marvel fans are still very upset about the news. A hashtag began trending to #SaveSpiderManFromSony. Fans were posting memes like the one above and hilarious video edits for good measure by the dozens. It might not bring Spider-Man back to the MCU immediately, but it was helping people ease the pain. Some Internet detectives later figured out that some of the accounts voicing their complaints about the Web-Slinger’s predicament are more sketchy than they seemed at first glance.

A number of the accounts in the hashtag seem to be Twitter bots, and that muddies the waters in this “fight” to come to an agreement a fair bit. That isn’t even the most out-there element of this story as a group of people made a Facebook event to bring Spider-Man back by force. The event is called “Storm Sony and Bring Spider-Man Home To The MCU,” and the organizers were probably inspired by that Area 51 raid that never really happened. This is 2019 in a nutshell people: Running into a corporate headquarters dressed like a superhero in an attempt to wrestle back control on behalf of the fans.

You may laugh as there were only 12 attendees in the first hour, but that number multiplied to almost 3000 in the 24 hours since. Plans to boycott the Sony films involving the character moving forward have been discussed in multiple online fan communities as well. Memes, Conspiracy theories, and Internet outrage, just another day for the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man.

Spider-Man: Far From Home is now in theaters. Upcoming Marvel Studios projects include Black Widow on May 1, 2020, The Falcon and The Winter Soldier in fall 2020, The Eternals on November 6, 2020, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings on February 12, 2021, WandaVision in spring 2021, Loki in spring 2021, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness on May 7, 2021, What If? In summer 2021, Hawkeye in fall 2021, and Thor: Love and Thunder on November 5, 2021.