Spider-Man No Way Home Preview and Breakdown
Welcome back to HLS Entertainment! Today we are going to be discussing absolutely everything you need to know before you watch Spider-Man No Way Home! We have a lot to get to so I will not waste time here, just a quick call to action please be sure to share and like this and follow me on Twitter @HaroldLStokes. Now as always, why should you listen to me? Because I have a very strong record calling Marvel films and tv shows is why. Here are the breakdowns I put out before, WandaVision, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, Loki, Black Widow, Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, Eternals and Hawkeye, my track record speaks for itself. Read one, two, or all of those and see that I know what I am talking about and let us move forward and breakdown No Way Home! I will warn you now, I might possibly call a lot of things correctly in the plot breakdown so SPOILERS. I do not have any special insider information I just love theorizing like everyone else, I just happen to be pretty decent at it. On to the breakdowns!
Locations to Know
New York City
Duh, but it is important here because this might be our first MCU Spider-Man movie to actually be contained to NYC. Homecoming spent a big chunk here but also spent a big chunk in Washington DC, and nearly all of Far From Home was in Europe. One thing to keep an eye out for is how a lot of the details of the city might have changed. Little things like park statues, to big things like the Statue of Liberty getting an upgrade. But a main one I want in your brain is, who bought Avengers' tower. It was teased to us in Far From Home that the building has been renovated and even includes an atrium now, but we are still in the dark about who purchased it.
Characters to Know
Okay so we have a ton of characters to know and not a lot of attention span, so I am going to be very brief about most of these and some I am just making up dumb jokes because I do not want this to be twelve pages long.
Peter Parker / Spider-Man - Tom Holland
Our lead star and title character, Tom Holland's Peter Parker was first introduced in 2016's Civil War and since then has led two solo films in Spider-Man Homecoming/Far From Home, and appeared in both Avengers Infinity War and Endgame. Peter will be dealing with the world that just found out his true identity.
Doctor Stephen Strange - Benedict Cumberbatch
Doctor Strange first appeared in his 2016 self-titled solo film then went on to appear in the post credit scene of Thor Ragnarok, and then appeared in both Avengers Infinity War and Endgame. Our dear Mister Doctor will be babysitting a bunch of high schoolers and trying to help clean up their messes.
MJ - Zendaya
MJ was first introduced to us as Michelle in Spider-Man Homecoming in 2017 then appeared in the sequel Far From Home in 2019. MJ has been dragged into the spotlight by being in a relationship publicly with Spider-Man and will be dealing with that pressure. I am sure we will also get to see a new side of her in this film as she is on team Spider-Man from the jump.
Ned Leeds - Jacob Batalon
After appearing in both MCU Spider-Man films Ned is the official "Guy in the chair" of Team Spider-Man and also its hype man.
Wong - Benedict Wong
Wong is played by Wong and has appeared in four MCU titles including Doctor Strange, both Avengers 3&4 and 2021's Shang-Chi and the Legend of almost a dozen rings. Wong is the comedic relief of the team.
Happy Hogan - Jon Favreau
Happy, ah Happy the glue that holds it all together. He has appeared in the most MCU movies of anyone on this list with six titles including all three FeMan films, both Spider-Man films and Avengers Endgame. I am just now realizing he was not in the first three Avengers films, and I am not Happy about that. Wait, that pun was not intended, but now I went back and capitalized the H.
May Parker - Marisa Tomei
Aunt May has appeared in four MCU titles including, Captain America Civil War, both Spider-Man films and Avengers Endgame. Some people call her the "hot Aunt May" but I am pretty sure that title belongs to Rosemary Harris.
J. Jonah Jameson - J.K. Simmons
The real film star of the bunch J. Jonah has appeared in FIVE Spider-People films across three universes as he was in all three Sam Raimi Spider-Man films, appeared at the end of Far From Home, and appeared in Venom Let there be Carnage's post credit scene.
Otto Octavius / Doc Ock - Alfred Molina
Doc Ock has not been seen since 2004's Spider-Man 2 and still might be the best villain in any Spider-Man film.
Norman Osbron / Green Goblin - Willem Dafoe
Norman Osborn appeared in all three of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man films only alive in the first one, he spent the rest of his time force ghosting and haunting the son he hated.
Max Dillon / Electro - Jamie Foxx
Sony blue it in the Amazing Spider-Man 2 writing the character completely wrong but thank goodness we are getting a second shot at the character with Jamie Foxx.
Flint Marko / Sandman - Thomas Haden Church (assumingly)
The character/actor that was hurt the most by the failure of Spider-Man 3, Thomas Haden Church did a great job portraying the character but was another victim of poor writing.
Curt Connors / The Lizard - Rhys Ifans (assumingly)
The Lizard appeared in 2012's The Amazing Spider-Man and in a movie that was just okay Rhys Ifans shown as a bright spot. This Lizard and Sandman are two big question marks as to who will be actually playing them or if they will even talk at all, as they could be more animalistic.
Peter Parker / Spider-Man - Tobey Maguire
Ah here we get into the murky waters of this movie, we have been given zero confirmation that these next five characters will appear but there have been plenty rumors to suggest they may. Appeared in all three Sam Raimi films as the titular character, Tobey's Peter will always have a special place in people's hearts.
Peter Parker / Spider-Man - Andrew Garfield
Andrew Garfield's Peter was just wasted by Sony in two movies in The Amazing Spider-Man 1 and 2 in 2012 and 2014. For comparisons that year we also got Avengers, and Winter Soldier / Guardians of the Galaxy respectively. There is a reason these movies failed.
Eddie Brock / Venom - Tom Hardy
We have now had two Venom films both staring Tom Hardy the second released just recently. And if you saw the second one... you know why he is here.
Matthew Murdock / Daredevil - Charlie Cox
Charlie Cox starred in his own Daredevil show on Netflix for three seasons, he also appeared in the Netflix Defenders show. Can you see why he is here?
Jennifer Walters / She-Hulk - Tatiana Maslany
Tatiana Maslany's She-Hulk show will be coming out soon in the first half of 2022, and if Peter needs a lawyer why not use this film as an opportunity to introduce our fourth wall breaking new Hulk family member?
Plot Breakdown
After being revealed as Spider-Man to the world and being framed for murder, Peter Parker enlists Doctor Strange to help him make the world forget that he is Spider-Man. The spell Strange was going to use to make people forget is messed up by Peter and now he must deal with the consequences of those actions and hunt down these Multiversal Spider-Villains and send them home!
The film starts with the end of Far From Home and Spider-Man's identity being Peter Parker being revealed. Peter had just set MJ down on the ground and now she ais getting surrounded by people so Peter swings down to grab her, the mob of people is a mixture of hate and love but either way not a safe situation and Peter and MJ swing away landing on a bridge so Peter can answer a facetime from his best friend Ned as they freakout about what just happened. They are surrounded on the bridge top by news helicopters so the pair swing away and escape, Peter drops MJ at home and goes to Aunt May.
Peter makes it home and has a conversation with May before cops show up to their apartment to arrest Peter. May, Ned and MJ are also brought in for questioning. The cops and Department of Damage Control are there questioning Peter about what happened with Mysterio, Peter tells the truth about the drones being the ones that actually "killed" him while they were still under Mysterio's control. This is where we could get our first huge cameo, but the question is will it be Charlie Cox's Matt Murdock or will it be Tatiana Maslany's Jennifer Walters. Peter is going to need a lawyer is the point and I imagine Happy will be the one to help set that up.
Peter is released by the police either on bail by Happy or because they choose to not press charges (doubtful but a possibility he did help save the universe). Peter tries to go back to normal returning to school that fall, but nothing is normal. We get a few scenes of Peter, MJ and Ned (third wheeling) struggling to deal with their newfound fame. We talk about Peter/Ned/MJ going to MIT. Maybe MJ can't afford MIT (based on her working in the diner) so he chooses to stay with her and Ned leaves cough cough and becomes Hob Goblin while off at college. I am sure we will get a scene or two of Tony Revolori's Flash Thompson trying to tag along with them (would be fun if he does the whole movie but has been edited out of scenes). We get a time shift of a few months of them in school, we see MJ working at a diner talking with Peter about how they cannot deal with this and that is when Peter sees the Halloween decorations and get the idea of going to Doctor Strange for help.
Peter shows up to the snow filled Sanctum Santorum and asks Stephen for help making people forget about Mysterio revealing his identity to the world. Wong is going off somewhere and hears their conversation and tells Strange that under no circumstance should he attempt the spell. I imagine this is Wong leaving to help with whatever deal we see him also working in Shang-Chi (when he was training Abomination) or he is just fed up with Strange and is moving back to Kamar-Taj, which would be fitting Strange is a jerk he can rub people the wrong way. Feels like a good time to shut down the theory that this is the "Evil Strange" from What if, no Strange is just an arrogant jerk, that is just who he is.
Of course, once Wong leaves Strange agrees to help Peter (probably just excited about trying out the spell Strange loves doing dangerous stuff). They go down to the basement to attempt the spell, we get a lot of Doctor Strange weirdness and goodness. During the spell Strange tells him the entire world will forget he is Spider-Man, including himself, this freaks Peter out and wants to add MJ to an exempt list to the spell. Strange agrees and does so but then Peter just keeps adding people to the list and Strange loses control of the spell and has to abort it. While aborting the spell we get the wild extra dimensional clip from the trailer of reality breaking. So, if you want to joke it is kind of technically Strange's fault for messing up the aborting of the spell. Little do we know at the time, but the spell reverts basically turning Peter into a magnet for Spider-Villains from other universes dragging them into the MCU.
Peter leaves after the aborted spell and goes back to life, we do not know how long a jump between that moment and when we see Peter interacting with the first inter universe Spider-Villain but there is a little gap at least. Next, we know Peter is on the Washington Bridge from the trailer, enter Doctor Otto Octavius. The giant commotion on the bridge causes Peter to suit up and swing into action, Doc Ock recognizes him as Spider-Man. Peter is obviously confused because he has never met Doc Ock. We get a giant bridge fight between the pair with Peter not really trying to attack him because he is confused. A car
Doc Ock keeps acting like he knows him, so Peter reveals himself to show they do not know one another. When Peter revealed himself is when Doc Ock's tentacles are wrapped around him, this is when the nano bots from the Iron Spider suit merge onto the tentacles. In Spider-Man 2 (2004) we are told his tentacles use nano tech, so it makes sense for them to merge. My question here is does Peter lose his entire suit in the merge. It is very important because this is when Willem Dafoe's Green Goblin appears to kill Spider-Man as well. I believe this is where Doctor Strange appears again (he also lives in NYC duh he can help, fixing a complaint from previous films). Strange helps fight the pair of villains and traps Doc Ock but Norman escapes flying off, and Peter joins Strange in returning to the Sanctum.
We get back to the Sanctum, Strange tells him about the spell messing up and sucked in people who are attached to Spider-Man including the inter universe leaks. They talk about the multiverse being a real thing Peter is enthralled but nervous about that, remember he got excited about it in Far From Home when Mysterio lied and said he was from another universe, hey look at them setting up future stuff. Peter acknowledges it is his fault and he will fix it (Great Power Great Responsibility), but he needs help. This is when he brings in MJ and Ned to Scooby this crap.
There have been rumors of a scene where Peter gets paint thrown on his normal red and black suit he made in Far From Home and he has to turn the suit inside out aka the black and gold suit we see in trailers, I just am not positive if this fits here or if it was earlier and that is why he is back in the Iron Spider suit on the bridge. Either way we get scenes of Peter trying to go villain hunting with a spell on his arm from strange to catch them. Including the trailer shot of Peter swinging amongst the powerlines trying to catch Electro. I am guessing we might see Peter fail a few times, this would be an amazing time to bring in the rumored other Spider-Men in Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield.
Peter traps them all in the magical box and bring it back to Doctor Strange, he then tells them about them dying fighting Spider-Man, this is where Peter gets a change of heart because he knows they are just getting sent back to die. Peter tries to steal the box to find another way but Strange stops him. We get a big set piece of Strange battling Peter for the box in the mirror dimension but ultimately the box gets opened and the villains are released needing to be captured once again. Peter owns up to this and feels guilty but still thinks they could deserve another shot.
Here I am theorizing we will get a scene of Norman Osborn gathering the other villains to band together and fight to stay here. It is personal for him specifically because his whole company and life was ruined by Spider-Man in his mind. This includes the broken Goblin helmet clip we see in the trailer, maybe he goes crazy Norm and smashes the helmet akin to Kylo smashing his in the Last Jedi. I am not positive how it fits but there will be a gathering of the villains prior to the final fight.
Our Peter now decides he needs a new suit because the Iron Spider suit is down after fighting Doc Ock and his Far From Home suit is messed up and covered in paint. He gets with Happy to make a new suit, or it would be cool to see Peter and Ned working together combining the remains of those two suits into a new one.
This is where news gets out of the meeting of the villains and Peter goes to stop them. J Jonah and the Daily Bugle are there amongst other news outlets and Department of Damage Control. Happy and May arrive for reasons unknown. The villains fight amongst themselves, Electro, the Lizard and Sandman escaping, and Peter is fighting Green Goblin and he throws a Pumpkin Bomb at Aunt May to distract or just extract vengeance on Peter. Peter knocks the bomb away, but May is still injured. This could be the scene we see of Peter with Happy sleeping in what seems to be a hospital waiting room while Peter is on facetime with MJ. May is okay but Peter is determined to set things right.
This is where the murky waters of this movie in the trailers gets even murkier, how do they get to the Statue of Liberty for the final fight. I believe Peter, possibly teamed up with Tobey and Andrew or even Daredevil, set a trap with Doctor Strange their and trick the villains into coming to fight. I imagine Ned and MJ are used in this scheme that explains why they are there in the trailers, or quite possibly it could be the opposite where the villains laid the trap for the Spider-People using Ned and MJ as bait (possibly MJs or a Gwen thrown in). BUT, this could be the facetime to the Daily Bugle we have seen in certain tv spots of Peter saying "I accidentally brought those dangerous things here, World if you're watching wish me luck. Your friendly neighborhood spiderman could use some" (I pieced the dialogue together) and Peter is using himself as bait to the villains.
We get our giant epic final fight scene of villains on heroes ending with Peter and Strange being able to finally trap them all (maybe back in the cube) and Strange sends them back home. But that is not where the excitement ends. After sending the villains back the reality around them begins to collapse. We see the giant purple breaks in reality (with some yellow in there too I wonder if that is Strange closing them or is it them merging with the MCU) and Strange is freaking out because he cannot stop them. The multiverse breaks, I believe coinciding with Sylvie stabbing He Who Remains, and things at the statue of Liberty end on a somber note of more multiverse shenanigans to come. All the Spider-Villains are gone, but the multiverse is still in shambles.
This is where I believe the movie comes to a close possibly with my previous theory about there still being twenty minutes left and Peter still having to deal with people knowing his identity you can read about that theory here.
So much of this film's ACTUAL story his still hidden from us brilliantly in the trailers so this plot breakdown can shift here or there but we know the major plot points and I cannot wait to see the movie this week and get surprised how it all comes together! On to theories!
Theories to Know
What if it works both ways aka Vulture left the MCU and is now in the Sony-Verse?
Think about this, in the trailers for Morbius we see Michael Keaton's Vulture interact with Jared Leto's Morbius briefly, and if Peter is a magnet for Spider-Villains does that not mean he could have repelled some of his own villains as well? This would be a perfect excuse to bump Keaton/Vulture over to the Sony Spider-Manless universe so they can use him meanwhile protecting the integrity of the MCU's cannon. Magnets do have two poles.
The final post credit scene will set up Doctor Strange Multiverse of Madness
Specifically, it will be introducing Xochitl Gomez's America Chavez/ Miss America. Even more specifically it will show off her unique power of multiverse hopping as she is seen possibly on the run and going to Doctor Strange.
What if it is not Tobey and Andrew returning but we see Charlie Cox's Daredevil fighting alongside Spider-Man at the end fight
I have fallen to the belief that Andrew and Tobey will be in this movie, but that all could easily still be fan speculation and the fire of theories getting flamed by the actors and studio to draw attention away from the real big thing, the return of Marvel Netflix characters. If you have been watching along and keeping up with Hawkeye, I am sure you are neck deep in theories about Vincent D'Onofrio's Kingpin arriving on the show very soon. Huh, I wonder why they timed it up for the penultimate Hawkeye episode to release the night before No Way Home? And with Kevin Feige just recently confirming in his usual vague way, if we see Daredevil in the MCU he will be played by Charlie Cox. Which brings me to my next theory.
The Multiverse is not going to get fixed anytime soon
Certainly, in this movie it is not. Maybe in Doctor Strange Multiverse of Madness but I still do not believe the multiverse is going to get fixed until it all collides together in Secret Wars. Secret Wars will be our next giant Avengers event that dwarfs Civil War in hero-on-hero violence as we see different variants of heroes square off against each other. It makes sense to set the stakes of Secret Wars being the universe is at stake. Maybe we replace the Beyonder controlling it with Kang, and it is all his little game that ends with the heroes teaming up together stopping him and setting their respective universes back in place. But can you undo merging of timelines and universes? I do not think you can, and my crazy theory is in the picture above, look at the purple breaks in reality, you see the one in the middle where the ends are yellow? I believe that is timelines/universes meshing and combining together. This means the Netflix characters get to stay if their universe was actually separate and is the easiest way to mesh the X-Men into our own universe and not have to worry about the "well where have they been all this time" question.
Where does Tom Hardy's Venom fit in?
In the post credit scene for Venom Let there be Carnage we see Tom Hardy get sucked into what we assume is the MCU. We see Tom Holland's Peter Parker on the tv screen and hear voice over from J Jonah Jameson. Does that mean he will be in this movie? Maybe? It would be awesome to see him teamed up with Peter facing down this Multiversal Sinister Six. Maybe Peter puts together his own team to stop them including himself, Tom Hardy's Venom, Tobey Maguire's Peter, Andrew Garfield's Peter, Charlie Cox's Daredevil and Doctor Strange. It is definitely on the table, but I imagine we will completely forget about him until the first post credit scene rolls around and we see Venom interacting with our Peter in a weird yet nonfighting way... which will end with the Venom Symbiote attaching itself to Peter.
Thank you so much for reading! Please be sure to follow me on Twitter @HaroldLStokes and like and retweet this breakdown! Also send me your craziest theory for this movie or for any upcoming MCU film! The ones I like the most I will try to discuss in my recap blog for this film!
