After waiting for what seemed like an eternity, Marvel and Sony Animation have finally released the first trailer for the animated Spider-Man film. What makes this film so unique isn’t just that it will star Miles Morales -- the film will tap into the Spider-Verse concept. No other Spider-Verse characters (Spider-Gwen, Spider-Man 2099, Spider-Ham, etc.) have been announced, but there is one shown at the end of the trailer, albeit briefly: Peter Parker.
If that is indeed the original Spider-Man, there’s only one logical choice to voice him: Andrew Garfield, who played Peter in Sony's Amazing Spider-Man reboot. Following Raimi’s trilogy of films, Garfield was saddled with the rather tough burden of playing a young webhead, and Garfield did his best. The first Amazing film may not live up to its lofty adjective, but it’s a solid movie that works because of him and the chemistry he had with Emma Stone’s Gwen Stacy. Unlike Toby Maguire, Garfield exuded the excitement and energy to come across as a teenager rather than a man in his 30s trying to act like one. He even managed to bring to life the playful Spider-snark Raimi's films lacked.
RELATED: Animated Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse Debuts First Trailer
As we know, Garfield’s planned tenure as Peter didn’t last beyond 2014's Amazing Spider-Man 2. Sony’s desire to cram as much sequel and spinoff bait as possible into the film effectively ended his future as a superhero and, pretty soon after, the franchise. Despite not being Garfield’s fault in any tangible way, the failure of Amazing came swiftly, to the mean-spirited delight of a number of fans. While Spider-Man 3 ended the Maguire-era Spidey's story properly, Garfiel'ds version will remain forever adrift. And it's Garfield’s unceremonious end that is exactly why he should voice the adult Peter in Spider-Verse. What's more, the film could be used to officially or unofficially wrap up that film series' story by making this Peter the same as the one Garfield played in live-action.
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The X-Men franchise gave closure to the majority of its original actors with Days of Future Past, and Logan played cleanup for Hugh Jackman and Patrick Stewart. Ryan Reynolds got a second shot at the game thanks to Deadpool, as has Jonah Hex star Josh Brolin as both Thanos and Cable. Even actors with shorter superhero tenures such as Brandon Routh and Zachary Levi found luck on their side thanks to Legends of Tomorrow and the upcoming Shazam! film. Garfield has yet to receive a similar chance. He once said the experience of playing Peter Parker, a character he loves, left him "heartbroken." Casting him as an adult Peter, even as an animated one, would provide him and the character some sort of resolution.
When the first Spider-Men crossover comic arrived in 2012, there was a noticeable age gap between Peter and Miles. The latter was 13 going on 14, and while Peter’s age could never be really placed, you could reasonably guess it's late-20s to early-30s. The animation side of the Spider-Man franchise has tightened the gap between them significantly, with the current cartoon appearing to place them a couple months apart at best. It wouldn’t be too surprising, then, if Spider-Verse’s Peter and Miles's gap was small> This would maintain the mentor/mentee dynamic while their relative youth doesn’t feel like a roadblock between them. By the time Into the Spider-Verse arrives, the Peter Parker of Amazing would be 23 or 24. That’s more than enough time for him to have enough experience to properly be a mentor to Miles.
Garfield’s inclusion in Spider-Verse would be thematically appropriate for both the actor and the Amazing films. In the lead up to Amazing 2, the actor was outspoken about wanting to have genuine changes to Peter Parker. He wanted a more modern interpretation of the character than was offered by Maguire in the past, or Tom Holland currently. He flat out stated that he considered Miles' introduction “a huge moment...a really beautiful and important move” in Spidey’s overall life. Thus, he was interested the two characters coexisting, or failing that, to pass the torch on to Miles’ eventual actor.
Spider-Man's big appeal is that he could be anyone under the mask, and you can see the potential for this in Amazing Spider-Man 2. Specifically, the brief scenes in the film wherein he interacts with a young boy named Jorge. First, we see him helping the boy with his science project. Jorge, in turn, dresses as his hero at the end of the film, being so brave as to stand up to Rhino before Peter saves him. It's not difficult to imagine Miles in place of Jorge, something fans certainly did at the time.
Producers Avi Arad (who is co-producing this film) and Matt Tolmach had a very different outlook on Miles, and were not on the same page as Garfield. For them, utilizing any Spider-hero that wasn't Peter would only happen when Sony was no longer in charge of him. That gun shy, incredibly backwards attitude is what made some fans clamor for Miles to replace Peter when the MCU joint custody deal was first announced.
Garfield's well-known interest in introducing Miles is something fans have considered to be a positive in his favor. With Marvel now having joint custody and making steps towards including Miles in the live action films, Garfield has some well-deserved vindication. By no means is he the reason that Miles is getting a movie, but Garfield's inclusion in the film could be a nice bit of schadenfreude.
Into the Spider-Verse provides the perfect opportunity to close out Garfield's story. Even if one didn't care for his pair of films, there's no denying that he got the raw end of a deal and deserves a proper send off. He would probably be game to do it to begin with, and it isn't like this universe would suddenly stop existing just because the series ended. Do it, Sony, let Garfield get one last swing in.
Produced by Avi Arad, Amy Pascal, Phil Lord, Christopher Miller and Christina Steinberg, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse stars Shameik Moore, Liev Schreiber, Mahershala Ali and Brian Tyree Henry. The film opens Dec. 14, 2018.