How Spider-Man: Far From Home Pulled Off That Post-Credits Cameo

As the saying goes, always save the best for last. Spider-Man: Far From Home was a great film according to glowing reviews and buzz across social media but it may have followed that popular saying. In Spider-Man: Far From Home‘s mid-credits scene, a surprising and epic cameo blew longtime fans of Marvel’s wallcrawler out of their seats. It turns out, the filmmakers behind the most recent entry to the Marvel Cinematic Universe always wanted to pull off the surprise cameo.

Spoilers for Spider-Man: Far From Home follow. Major spoilers!

When Spider-Man landed in New York City, his time home was quickly spoiled when Mysterio sent a recorded message to the Daily Bugle which framed him as the criminal villain behind the elemental attacks around the world. When the monitors on the City streets showed the face of the Daily Bugle’s voice, it was J.K. Simmons playing J. Jonah Jameson. The same beloved actor from the original Spider-Man trilogy is officially playing a brand new version . of the same character. In the video above, the filmmakers behind Spider-Man: Far From Home break down the special cameo appearance by Simmons.

“It was an idea we had from the very earliest conversations of, if we at Marvel Studios get to work with Sony and make a Spider-Man movie, we want to bring Jameson back, somehow,” Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige told ComicBook.com. “And thinking about who it could be, we really thought J.K. as an actor is so versatile, and you look at his amazing iconic performance in the Raimi films. But then look at his amazing performances in Whiplash and in other films. You go, ‘It can be the same guy but a different tone, and tap into sort of more modern, news personalities of today.’”

According to producer Amy Pascal, this was always part of the plan. “Well, we always knew we were going to do that from the beginning,” Pascal said. “But we never even put it in the script because we never said it was him that was on the newscast.” Filmmakers can never be too safe with such spoilers when Tom Holland is around.

J. Jonah Jameson and the Daily Bugle’s debuts are signs of the where the next Spider-Man story will take place and grow in the character’s next big screen outing. “We’ve spent, certainly the five Tom Holland as Spider-Man in the MCU films that we’ve made together, has been about taking him literally out of New York to different places, things we’ve never seen before with him, space briefly, interact with the Avengers, Europe in this film,” Feige said. “As he came back to New York, suggesting, ‘Okay, we’re going to get back to that.’ How awesome is it seeing him swing around at the end of that movie, and with the web wings glide through a under-construction version of Avengers Tower.”

Of course, Feige isn’t ready to reveal who bought Avengers Tower in Spider-Man: Homecoming, saying, “I didn’t see a sign there yet.”

Director Jon Watts clarified that Simmons’ J. Jonah Jameson is not from any sort of multiverse in Spider-Man: Far From Home. He is from thee Marvel Cinematic Universe which fans have been following since 2008’s Iron Man. “It’s a new take on the same character that happens to be played by the same actor,” Watts said.

“Well, if he didn’t want to do it, we wouldn’t have done it,” Watts said of Simmons. “It’s his iconic performance. So I think it was a little weird to him at first. He was like, ‘Wait, what do you want me to do?’ He’s like, ‘Guys, those were different films, don’t you understand?’ But as soon as we pitched him the concept and the slightly different take on the character, he was totally on board.”

The different take on the character and the impact of the shocking post-credits scenes will be a major influence on the next Spider-Man film. “There’s certainly going to be big repercussions from the way we end this film,” Watt said.

Spider-Man: Far From Home is now playing in theaters.