After Marvel and Sony shook hands and signed papers to partner up on Spider-Man, the rumor mill and fanboy dream wheel spun around in circles, with talk that the studios would use the opportunity, and the increasingly loud calls for onscreen diversity, to bring the Black Hispanic Miles Morales instead of Peter Parker to the big screen. That didn’t happen, with Tom Holland taking the role of Peter Parker/Spider-Man in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. However, Sony has made a wise move that will not only let their brewing standalone animated movie have a clear distinction from Marvel’s live-action Spidey, but also allow them to diversify their superhero slate.
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According to Heroic Hollywood, Miles Morales will be the focus of the untitled animated Spider-Man movie that will be written and produced by Phil Lord and Chris Miller (no director has been named just yet). It will certainly be nice not get yet another Peter Parker origin story (though “Captain America: Civil War” nicely cut to the chase and side-stepped around it in that regard), and give mainstream moviegoers a Spider-Man story that many aren’t familiar with. Here’s how the Marvel Wikia describes the beginnings of Miles Morales, though I’m sure Lord and Miller will tinker with it a bit:
After Norman Osborn was arrested by S.H.I.E.L.D, and publicly revealed as the Green Goblin, Osborn Industries was left abandoned. Nearly two months before Peter Parker’s death, a thief broke into Osborn Industries. Unbeknownst to the thief, a spider genetically enhanced with the Oz Formula crawled into his bag.
Miles Morales, a young kid from Brooklyn visited his uncle Aaron Davis (which was against his parents’ wishes, due to his uncle’s criminal past) after being awarded the final spot in a charter school lottery. At his uncle’s apartment Miles was bitten by the Oz-enhanced spider, which emerged from Aaron’s bag, and Miles discovered he received super-human abilities like camouflage, increased agility, and some sort of stun blast. After revealing his newly found powers to his best friend, Ganke Lee, both concluded he had power similar to Spider-Man’s, including wall-crawling. But Miles reacted negatively, as he just wanted to be normal, and decided to leave heroism to the actual Spider-Man.
Months later, Spider-Man died saving his family from Osborn. Miles arrived late to the scene. Struck with grief at not helping Peter Parker before his demise, Miles decided to follow Parker’s philosophy — with great power comes great responsibility — and so continue Peter’s legacy.
Right now, the working title for the movie is reportedly “Miles Morales: The Ultimate Spider-Man” (or vice versa), but there’s plenty of time to figure that out. The animated movie will arrive on December 21, 2018. What do you think of this development? Let us know in the comments section.
