When the Marvel Cinematic Universe began, Iron Man was the perfect hero to kick things off and welcome what would become a huge milestone in the movie industry and the superhero genre. At the time, only some studios had done projects like this, bringing in the X-Men, the Fantastic Four, or Spider-Man, for example. The latter, in particular, quickly became a favorite for a lot of people. With Sam Raimi in charge, Peter Parker got a trilogy that’s still remembered and loved to this day. What not everyone knows is that back in 2008, there was actually a specific plan to include him in the MCU – through a crossover.
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Everyone knows it took way too long for Peter to show up in an MCU movie. That’s because of the whole issue with Sony, since the studio held his rights and wouldn’t let him appear in other types of projects (even if they involved other superheroes). It wasn’t until 2016, in Captain America: Civil War, that we got to meet Tom Holland’s Spider-Man who became a total phenomenon. He later got his own solo films and even an expanded universe with his villains, plus a multiverse movie with his variants. But have you ever wondered what it would’ve been like if Tony Stark had first crossed paths with Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man? Because that was seriously on the table.
The real plan back then was to have Spider-Man “pop up” in Iron Man. But how would that have worked? Here’s the interesting part: Dr. Otto Octavius. In Spider-Man 2, we see him turn into a villain for the first time. Specifically, there’s no real explanation for where his famous robotic tentacles came from. What we do see is that everything goes wrong during a demo of one of his projects, and the tentacles sort of take on a life of their own, becoming part of his body for good. But in an early draft of Iron Man‘s script, Stark was actually the one who helped him create the tech. It was always implied that Doc Ock built it himself, but originally, that wasn’t the case.
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There were even some clues about this in Spider-Man: No Way Home (or at least that’s what people thought). At first, it was something fans picked up on when the first images from the movie dropped, as it turned out that Doc Ock’s tech looked a bit different from what we saw in Raimi’s movie. With a new color scheme, it kind of seemed like the material in his tentacles had some Stark tech in there. Later, when the movie came out, we saw that this new look came from a blend of his tech with Stark’s, right when Holland’s Peter gets caught and his suit grabs Doc Ock’s attention. That’s how the two of them kind of “met” in the universe – a subtle and cool way of showing a connection that could’ve happened in the past.
In the end, the whole idea was dropped because of copyright issues with Sony. But even though that kind of crossover would’ve been very cool at the time, everything worked out the way it was meant to. Bringing in a new Spider-Man to the MCU was the right call. Keeping Raimi’s universe separate was a smart move, especially for fans who love Maguire’s Spider-Man. As much as it was tempting to explore that version of Peter Parker in the MCU, it was a double-edged sword – if it hadn’t been done right, it could’ve messed with the legacy that the trilogy had built. And let’s be honest: Spider-Man: No Way Home had to happen. If things had gone differently, the world might never have gotten such a legendary, unforgettable movie.
Maguire’s Spider-Man is still that nostalgic symbol of an era, while Holland’s Spidey found his place with a whole new generation. Marvel was trying to build something fresh from the ground up, and throwing in a hero from another universe that already had his own story could’ve thrown things off balance right away. When Holland finally showed up, he brought exactly the kind of energy the MCU needed at that point. Plus, his chemistry with Robert Downey Jr. was unbeatable and ended up becoming one of the emotional highlights of the whole saga. That just wouldn’t have hit the same with an older, already-established version of Spider-Man. So more than just a legal thing with rights, it’s all about vision and timing.
To sum up, everything clicked exactly the way it was supposed to.
