This morning, Sony and Marvel gave us our first proper look at Spider-Man: Brand New Day (after a whole day’s worth of lots of incredibly small glimpses), lifting the lid on a whole new era for the MCU’s take on Peter Parker. There were plenty of familiar faces from across the MCU, and also some big hints as to some of the comic book influences the movie might be taking on. Let’s break it all down, shall we?
The trailer opens with Peter Parker (Tom Holland) glum and upside down, watching social media videos on his phone. Not just any videos, though: ones of his former friends, Ned (Jacob Batalon) and MJ (Zendaya), as they celebrate their first day at MIT. Of course, you’ll remember that at the end of Spider-Man: No Way Home, Peter implored Doctor Strange to cast a spell that would erase all knowledge of his secret identity being exposed in the climax of Far From Home—which also meant that even his closest friends wouldn’t know who he is. Womp womp.
Peter promptly jumps off the girder he was doomscrolling from, but not because of the depression, because it looks like he’s gone all-in on being Spider-Man now that he doesn’t have to worry about those pesky social connections (he’s going to worry about them, though, because he’s Peter Parker). Masked up, and wearing a new but very similar suit to the one we saw him in the final moments of No Way Home, he plummets down towards the city.
We’ve known from the recent leak of a synopsis from the film’s official artbook—and now confirmed by a new synopsis for the film released by Sony today—that four years have passed since the events of No Way Home, but perhaps the clearest thing in this trailer is that Peter’s anguish about losing his friends is going to be a driving factor of this film. We see Peter mulling over a note he’s written to potentially talk to either Ned or MJ revealing their past connection, following them around the city, which we start hearing in his narration too: “Hi! My name is Peter Parker. You don’t remember me, but we used to know each other. Something bad was going to happen, and the only way to stop was to make everyone forget about me.”
As this narration plays out, we see Ned and MJ sitting in their apartment watching a news broadcast as Spider-Man is awarded the key to New York City. Said key (which we see Peter fiddling with in his own apartment, waiting for his suit to be done in the washing machine) is handed to him by an unidentified female government official. Typically, it would be the mayor of the city who does this kind of thing, and as we know circa Daredevil: Born Again, Wilson Fisk was our most recently known inheritor of the office.
We have had hints that Born Again‘s second season, which conveniently kicks off next week, will have some connections to Brand New Day. Probably don’t expect a cameo from Matt Murdock himself again, as he did in No Way Home, but it’ll probably give us an answer as to another factoid we already know: Vincent D’Onofrio’s Fisk is definitely not in this movie.
“Because I’m not just Peter Parker,” Pete’s narration continues. “I’m Spider-Man.” We cut to an action sequence we’ve seen hinted at since Brand New Day started filming last year, as Spidey swings into action during an armored car chase. Miniguns, explosions, our hero being violently slammed into cars, it has it all!
Speaking of our hero being violently slammed into motor vehicles, we comedically cut to Spider-Man being bowled clean over by a large black van… driven by Frank Castle (Jon Bernthal, reprising the role from Daredevil and the wider former-Netflix-Defenders oeuvre). Fun fact: this is the first time that a live-action adaptation of the Punisher has actually given him his Battle Van from the comics. It’s a mobile base of command chock full of guns that has appeared in various iterations in the comics since the concept was first introduced in 1975’s Giant-Sized Spider-Man #4.
It’s clear that Peter and Frank already have something of a rapport, even if that rapport involves Frank still trying to shoot a grenade launcher right into Pete’s chest. We see that Frank is involved in this big chase sequence, as Spider-Man takes him out with a web-enhanced kick clean through the Battle Van’s windshield. Befitting his background from the more maturely rated corners of the wider Marvel universe, he even gets off a cheeky “Motherf-” before Spidey censors him. Not in this movie, Frank, there’s kids watching!
We cut away from the action to see Peter skulking about at a party, which is happening in none other than MJ and Ned’s apartment. “But sometimes Spider-Man has to do the hard thing, even if it breaks Peter Parker’s heart,” his narration continues, as Peter mournfully stares over at his old friends, and we get a very interesting shot.
MJ is being flirted with… by Ahsoka‘s Ezra Bridger!? Well, Star Wars live-action star Eman Esfandi, the MCU multiverse is probably not that crazy yet. It’s clear, however, that this isn’t a first-time encounter, as the two are very familiar with each other. MJ has had plenty of non-Peter romantic interests in the comics, especially in the aftermath of their on-again, off-again status ever since their marriage was controversially retconned out of existence in the infamous “One More Day” storyline.
There’s every unhinged possibility that Efsandi is playing some version of Paul Rabin—arguably one of the most unpopular comics characters Marvel has created this century. He was introduced in 2022 as the son of a mysterious villain known as the Emissary Peter was wrangling with at the time, through multiversal time dilation silliness. MJ spent four years with Paul trapped in another universe, adopting two children and putting the kibosh on Peter and MJ’s relationship together once more. After the whole deal with the Emissary was resolved, Paul stuck around as a major supporting character in the comics, helping MJ in her fledgling vigilante career before she became the host of the Venom symbiote. They broke up, to much rejoicing, last year.
It would be very funny if Esfandi was playing Paul, there’s another potentially interesting candidate given the collegiate trappings of Brand New Day: what if he’s the MCU’s take on Harry Osborn, paving the way for an eventual debut of his father Norman at some point? Yes, we had Willem Dafoe’s iconic portrayal be a major part of No Way Home, but the MCU’s primary timeline has yet to give us its own take on one of the most iconic Spidey characters from the books yet.
Peter returns to his own apartment looking decidedly worse for wear and collapses to the floor, and we cut to him waking up wearing nothing but his boxers and suddenly webbed up in a cocoon outside his apartment window. A cocoon he promptly falls out of, which is not great as again, Peter is not wearing anything but something to protect a shred of his dignity, and that includes his web shooters…
Which is suddenly not a problem, because he reflexively thwips up to stop himself, and does so. This is a clear indication that the MCU Peter is now going to have organic webbing as part of his power kit getting a major overhaul. Ironically, organic webbing was first introduced in Sam Raimi’s 2002 Spider-Man adaptation—which proved so popular that Marvel Comics copied the idea for some early movie-comic synergy, giving comics Peter organic webbing in a 2004 storyline, after a kiss from the villainess known as the Queen mutated his powers. Funnily enough, after the events of “One More Day” in the comics, Peter lost the organic webs again, among other tweaks to his powers, reverting back to using web shooters.
But the combination of Peter having what definitely seems like a stress-induced power change and the emergence from a cocoon seems to hint that Brand New Day is taking on inspiration from another major comics storyline. There have been several Spider-Man stories where Peter has undergone some sort of power mutation at a not-great time in his personal life. The Six Arms Saga in 1971 for example, which introduced Morbius the Living Vampire, saw a dejected Peter actively attempt to cure himself of his powers, only to, well, accidentally give himself another four arms, as the storyline name suggests. The storyline was also loosely adapted for the second season of the ’90s Spider-Man animated series, “Neogenic Nightmare.”
But the cocoon itself plays a role in a more prominent story that is likely the source of the inspiration here: “The Other,” a mid-aughts arc that likewise sees a stressed Peter experience fluctuations in his powers changing and facing seeming death. After an apparently fatal encounter with Morlun—the spider-hunting, energy-sucking multiversal head of the family known as the Inheritors, who become a major threat in the first Spider-Verse crossover—Peter finds himself undergoing a mystical rebirth, shedding his old body and re-emerging from a giant webbing cocoon on the Brooklyn Bridge.
Having learned his greater connection to spider-based cosmic forces and his supernatural connection to a giant spider deity, the titular Other in the process, embracing his totemic spider aspect along the way. Peter gets a bit of an overall upgrade to his usual powers in the story (he already had organic webbing at the time), as well as several new ones, including night vision, the ability to sense vibrations through his webs, and wrist-mounted stingers.
Back to the trailer. Peter goes to school for some surreptitious help with his changes—we see him wearing a hoodie with the logo of Empire State University on it, Peter’s higher-education place of choice in the comics. But there, he finds another old friend who doesn’t recognize him in the form of Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo), who is doing less hulking out these days and more professorial duties.
“If DNA is mutating, that would be enormously dangerous,” Bruce tells Peter, as we cut through a montage of Peter facing several changes to his powers—dazed by his heightened senses, his apartment plastered with webbing, and him overshooting a websling with new strength and agility, smashing into a water tower at high velocity. Ouch!
We cut to Peter laying flowers in the rain at Aunt May’s grave, which dates her death and No Way Home at a nebulous point in 2024, making Brand New Day set sometime in 2028. The quote on her tombstone—”When you help someone, you help everyone”—also appeared on it in that movie, and is a direct reference to the 2018 Insomniac game, Marvel’s Spider-Man, where May used the quote and had it engraved on her tombstone when she died during its climax.
Over a montage of explosive action, we hear a very surprising voice enter the trailer’s narration: acting legend Keith David! We don’t know who he’s playing, but it’s clear he has some understanding of what’s happening to Peter. “Spiders have three life cycles,” David’s narration begins. “When between cycles, it can leave the spider vulnerable to threats.”
During this, we see what appears to be the climax of the earlier armored truck chase scene—Peter confronts the crashed truck alongside several armed guards after it seemingly crashes into a prison facility (we see facility officers and what appear to be prisoners react to the explosion outside, and the interior definitely looks like prison cells), only to discover whoever was inside it was a disoriented older woman. Only, her face changes, and suddenly twists, as if some sort of possessive spirit flies out of it, first into one of the armed guards behind Spidey, who fixes him with a smirk before the spirit jumps up to someone on the gantry above them.
“We are faced with a danger that we can’t control,” a new voice entering the narration says, before it’s revealed to be Tramell Tillman’s mystery new character. “One we can’t even see.” There’s been rumors that Tillman’s role leans more towards the villainous side of things, but at least in this moment, he appears to be working with Spider-Man to figure out what this posessive force is.
We then cut to what could be a hint of that force: a hooded figure raising their arms in a challenge in front of an array of computer screens and technology in what looks like an otherwise run-down apartment. Considering we don’t see her elsewhere in the trailer, there’s a decent chance that this is the mystery character played by Stranger Things star Sadie Sink.
There has been tons of speculation—mostly because she has red hair—that Sink is heralding the MCU’s impending arrival of the X-Men, and playing some form of Jean Grey, the powerful psionic mutant and inheritor of the Phoenix Force. If (and it’s a big if; Sink has tried to deny the rumor at every turn) this is some version of Jean, it seems like a big change, especially if, as it appears here, they have a villainous streak. Jean can also use her omega-level powers to psychically control other people’s minds, if this figure is connected to the possession we saw (the trailer definitely wants you to think that, but it could be an editing misdirection).
Those remain big ifs, and we don’t get any answers in this footage. Earlier rumors have suggested that Sink’s character retains knowledge of Peter’s true identity, so villain or otherwise, she’s either someone who was immune to Strange’s spell, or comes from another part of the multiverse and was not affected when it was cast. Whoever she is, she’s bigger than just Spider-Man: Sink will appear in the Doomsday sequel Avengers: Secret Wars, so she’s definitely going to have a long game at play here.
As the trailer starts climaxing, we get our first look at another returning villain: Michael Mando as Mac Gargan, aka the Scorpion. Mando appeared briefly in Spider-Man: Homecoming‘s mid-credits scene, where he encountered the Vulture locked up in prison. Now he actually gets to be the Scorpion and fight Spider-Man! If what we saw with the armored truck earlier leads to a prison break, there’s a possibility he escapes during it. We know a few more villains are in the movie too beyond him, including Tombstone (played by Marvin Jones III, who voiced the character in Into the Spider-Verse), and Boomerang, a frequent low-level foe of Spidey’s from the comics.
After we get a brief shot of Frank telling Spidey that he’s losing it, we get another interesting tease: MJ and Spider-Man, face to face. Will she re-learn who he is beneath the mask by the end of this movie? What ramifications will that have, will their relationship start all over or will the memories of her time with Peter come back?
“And for those Spiders who make it through, it amounts to a kind of…” David’s narration continues, as we set up a tantalizing montage of shots. First up is the first teaser we got of the trailer yesterday: Spider-Man swinging through the air with someone slung under his arm, a recreation of the character’s iconic cover debut on Amazing Fantasy #15.
We then get antother slow-mo shot of Spidey battling another villain: the aforementioned Boomerang, wearing a very comics-faithful look! This is another comic cover adaptation, this time 1991’s Amazing Spider-Man #345, although Boomerang is wearing his more modern suit.
Another shot, on a boat as police officers watch, Peter battles another masked villain with clawed foot blades. This appears to be the MCU’s take on Tarantula, because yes, this is another comics cover Easter egg: it’s a recreation of Amazing Spider-Man #134, Tarantula’s debut issue.
Not a comics cover recreation this time, but another surprise comics addition: inside a prison, an unmasked Peter does battle with the red-clad ninjas. These are clearly agents of the Hand, one of Marvel’s premier ninja factions. The Hand previously played a significant role in Netflix’s Daredevil TV series and The Defenders crossover, but this marks their film debut for the MCU. Could their return be the major Daredevil: Born Again link we’ll see explored in that show’s second season?
A brief shot sees Peter’s eyes turn jet-black, before we cut back to the Hand fight and he quickly web-parries an incoming Hand ninja’s sword, shattering it. Clearly, Peter’s powers have had their upgrade here. Are these black eyes related to the night vision he got in “The Other,” or is it just a reflection of his more animalistic spider-side manifesting?
As we climax on another shot of Peter mid-battle with the Hand, David’s character finishes their narration: “Rebirth.” If this is taking lots of inspiration from “The Other,” is David playing the MCU’s version of Morlun? Or could he be the Other himself, lending his voice to the spider-god that Peter learns to embrace in his transformation?
A final ending gag goes back to Ned and MJ’s apartment party, where MJ compliments Peter for bringing flowers as a housewarming gift. We get a cute “friendly neighbor” gag to refer to Spidey’s oft-quoted title, but the most interesting thing here: MJ is still wearing the broken black dahlia necklace Peter gifted her in Far From Home when they began their romantic relationship. Oof, that’s gotta hurt.
Overall, Brand New Day‘s first trailer gives us lots to chew on, but keeps a lot of mysteries close to its chest. While we can infer lots of fun comic book connections here, the overall plot of the film, and how it could set the stage for Avengers: Doomsday later this year (Holland will not appear in that film, as far as we currently know, but is likely to have some role in Secret Wars), especially given the mysteries surrounding Sadie Sink’s character.
No doubt we’ll get a few more clues as we get closer and closer to the release of Spider-Man: Brand New Day on July 31.
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