Brand New Day Almost Featured a Spidey Villain Who Already Bombed at the Box Office (& The Film Had a Home Alone Connection)

Spider-Man: Brand New Day featured Spider-Man dealing with a psychic who was terrorizing New York City, only to learn it was a young mutant named Jean Grey. However, Jean Grey wasn’t in the plans when the script was started, and there were several different ideas for villains to appear in the movie. In fact, the writers kept getting shot down for different villains, and this has been happening for years, going as far back as Spider-Man: No Way Home. Spider-Man: Brand New Day co-writer Chris McKenna said he had ideas for several villains that he couldn’t use. He mentioned wanting to use the Spot in Spider-Man: No Way Home as well as the mutant villain known as the Shadow King for Spider-Man: Brand New Day.

McKenna was speaking to The Bulwark about villains he has wanted to use over the years, and he mentioned one that he had big plans for. McKenna said that he wanted to make a Spider-Man movie where he fought Kraven the Hunter, and it was tied to the themes from Home Alone.

Spider-Man: Brand New Day Screenwriter Had Plans for Kraven the Hunter

In the interview, McKenna said that he had a huge idea for Kraven the Hunter to enter the MCU. He said that he was told that Sony had no plans to use Kraven at all in a solo movie, so that meant he was available to use in the MCU. As a result, McKenna came up with a massive story about Kraven showing up to hunt for Spider-Man. He said the idea was for Kraven to turn New York City into a giant playground full of Home Alone traps for Spider-Man to fall into.

While the most popular Kraven story in Marvel Comics was “Kraven’s Last Hunt,” this sounds more like it would go along with the ideas from Hunted, which saw Kraven using Central Park as a trap. Thinking of a movie where Spider-Man keeps falling into Kraven’s elaborate traps sounds like a fun idea, and having it come across like Kevin McCallister’s Home Alone traps is even better. However, it was never meant to be.

McKenna said that, after coming up with the plans, Sony reversed course and created its Kraven the Hunter movie, which ended up as a box office flop and the last Sony spinoff movie for now. McKenna had to change directions, but then he got more bad news. He came up with an idea for the Chameleon and then learned that he was also being used in the Kraven movie. McKenna said it was “difficult” to get all the assets for movies like Spider-Man: Brand New Day because of these agreements with Sony. “We are just kind of eating each other’s lunches,” McKenna said.

It was fascinating to hear McKenna reveal how movies like Spider-Man: No Way Home and Spider-Man: Brand New Day came together, with villains being shot down for different reasons. While Sony and Marvel working together has resulted in some great movies, it has also cost fans some fun moments, like Kraven the Hunter setting up traps all over New York City for Spider-Man to fall into.

Spider-Man: Brand New Day Script Actually Included the MCU Hero Everyone Was Expecting (But Was Cut)