My Hopes for the MCU's Spider-Man 4

NOTE: I started writing this blog in 2023, long before anything for "Brand New Day" had been revealed, and then forgot about it (whoops), so this will more so be what my hopes were after watching "No Way Home," and not likely what we'll get in the actual movie.

Spoilers (of course) for "Spider-Man: No Way Home"

As we all know, the end of No Way Home created ENDLESS possibilities for the MCU's Spider-Man going forward. Everyone has forgotten who Peter Parker is; he's all alone without his girlfriend, friends, family, or the Avengers. He's back to being a friendly neighborhood Spider-Man fighting street-level crime.

So what do I hope to see? Let's get started.

The Villain: No Way Home gave us a multitude of classic Spider-Man villains, in addition to the ones we had in the previous installments - Vulture, Shocker, Mysterio. What I want out of this movie (and trilogy as a whole) are Spider-Man villains we've NEVER seen before in live action. The one I'm hoping for most, simply because he was teased already and I want them to pay that off, is Scorpion. Scorpion is such a cool and underrated Spider-Man villain in that not only can he match Spidey's strength and durability, but he has his own arachnid powers! We know Venom was teased as being in the MCU so that will come into play eventually, but I'm not expecting to see that until the third movie in the trilogy.

New Friends: Since Peter lost Ned and MJ, he'll have to make new friends. I think this is the perfect opportunity to introduce our live action Miles Morales. He was hinted to in Homecoming by Donald Glover's character (who is Miles' uncle), so they could work around the age difference by just having Miles have NOT been snapped away by Thanos. So in those 5 years Peter was gone, Miles caught up in age and they're now both freshman in college. No spider powers yet, but that could be a post-credit scene that gets explored in the second movie. I also would like to see Peter befriend Felicia Hardy (Black Cat).

Love Interest: With MJ out of the picture, I don't necessarily think Peter will forget about her and move on right away. HOWEVER, I think it's very practical Peter could find himself in a more flirtatious, no-strings-attached type of relationship to keep his mind off MJ. Felicia Hardy is the perfect character to do that. Perhaps she gets tied up in theft to pay the bills or pay for her college and Spider-Man stops her, but eventually they each get unmasked and spark some romance.

The Story: This is the point in this blog where I stopped writing 3 years ago, so it feels pointless to speculate on the story when we already have a good idea of it from the trailers. There's a mind-controlling villain (Jean Grey?) who brings out Savage Hulk again, while Peter is dealing with the fallout of his friends not knowing who he is, MJ having a new boyfriend, and Peter's body mutating to have organic webbing. Scorpion is a villain, so I'm happy that I fulfilled that, but he will likely be a minor villain that Spidey fights a few times at the beginning of the movie. I was hoping he would be the one involved with making Bruce Banner lose his mind again, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

Other than that, no direct signs of Miles Morales in the trailer. I could see him showing up in a post-credit scene for the next movie. No Black Cat either, which has me pretty bummed. One of these days, we'll get a live-action Black Cat!

Final Thoughts: I made sure to snag tickets to see this on opening weekend when I saw how fast they were selling. Between this and Avengers Doomsday at the end of the year, I'm not sure which I'm excited for more, but this has the chance to be one of the best (or at least a top) live-action Spider-Man movie. The cinematography, humor, everything looks like a huge step up from the "Home" trilogy.

What are you most excited to see in Brand New Day?