Sony Pictures has been itching for some time to build out a Spider-Man-based cinematic universe using a number of the characters they have access to through their licensing agreement for Spider-Man. They currently have Tom Holland as Peter Parker/Spider-Man interacting with the rest of Marvel’s Cinematic Universe through a rather unique rights sharing deal. And as we see this weekend, they have now released their second film featuring the popular 1990s era character Venom, while early next year will see them release Morbius, based on a Spider-Man related vampiric anti-hero character. Beyond that, Sony has Kraven The Hunter starring Aaron Taylor-Johnson set for an early 2023 release and a film featuring the character Madame Web in development. Writers Roberto Orci and Olivia Wilde are also developing their own, as yet unnamed, Spider-Verse projects.
But how is Sony looking towards making these films intersect in the way that the mainstream MCU works? There might be a clue to be found in a scene that pops up midway through the end credits of Venom: Let There Be Carnage. (Spoilers follow, obviously.)
The Scene
Following the main events of the film, Eddie and Venom have fled to Mexico to avoid the police, who now know about Eddie’s unique relationship with Venom. The scene opens with Eddie and Venom relaxing one evening in a rather dingy, cheap hotel room watching a Mexican soap opera. Venom casually mentions to Eddie that he has 80 billion years of Hive knowledge at his disposal, and offers to give Eddie just a small glimpse as to what that must be mentally like.
But before he can really do that, a bright light enters into the room. Once it fades, Eddie and Venom find that the dingy room has changed. It is now much cleaner, has nicer furnishings and a a new flat-screen TV.
The TV is no longer playing a Mexican soap opera, but a news cast. The news breaking news report should be familiar to anyone who has already seen Spider-Man: Far From Home – It is J Jonah Jameson’s rant exposing Spider-Man as teenager Peter Parker and (mistakenly) identifying him as the killer of Quentin Beck, aka Mysterio.
Venom is very interested in who this young man named Peter Parker might be.
Analysis
Well, it is fairly obvious that Eddie and Venom have been transported from their own Earth (designate Earth-TRN688) into the Earth depicted in the Marvel Cinematic Universe(Earth-199999). But exactly what was the mechanism that got them there?
Was it a byproduct of the timeline branching shenanigans we saw in Loki? That is a possibility, though perhaps unlikely.
More likely their being apparently transported to the mainstream Marvel Cinematic Universe is a side effect from what ever multiverse bending hi-jinks Peter Parker and Doctor Strange will be getting into as hinted in the trailer for Spider-Man: No Way Home, which will be hitting theaters in December. Add to the fact that we know that Doc Ock (Alfred Molina) and probably Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe) will be crossing over from the Toby Maguire Spider-Man movies as will Electro from the Andrew Garfield led Amazing Spider-Man 2 will be making an appearance, then you don’t need to shake a magic 8-ball to known that in this case “Signs point to yes.”
Sony has been anxious to do a “Sinister Six” movie, which would team-up a number of Spider-Man villains in a way which can only be described as the anti-Avengers. Back in 2014, Sony was very actively working on laying the groundwork for such a film in Amazing Spider-Man 2, although that might have been to the film’s detriment. Even after that iteration of Spider-Man was set aside in favor of a new launch of the character that would be able to interact with Marvel’s Cinematic Universe, the studio kept quietly developing the Sinister Six concept.
In addition to the villains mentioned above, there have been a number of rumors concerning other villains from the two previous cycles of Spider-Man films possibly showing up in Spider-Man: No Way Home. Will all of these potential baddies team up to form a cinematic version of the Sinister Six? And what will Venom’s place in the story possibly be? How much water do those rumors hold or will they just turn out to be fans speculating off of Sony’s long known desire to do a Sinister Six film? The answer to these will most likely be revealed when Spider-Man: No Way Home hits theaters on December 17.
