Even though Marvel has increasingly become known for characters like Iron Man, Black Widow, Wolverine, Thor, and others, the fact remains that Spider-Man still reigns supreme. For example, people often react when one of their favorite characters undergo a change but fans were outraged when word broke that Spidey likely is leaving the MCU.
Even though most moviegoers clearly want Spider-Man to remain in the MCU, the truth of the matter is that the wall-crawler is fully capable of making it on his own. After all, there have been seven major Spider-Man movies as of this writing. What many fans may not realize, however, is that a lot of interesting things happened behind the scenes of those films. With that in mind, it is time to get to this list of 15 things that really happened behind the scenes of Spider-Man Movies.
15 Complicated Suit
Widely considered to be a marvelous film, Sam Raimi’s first Spider-Man movie succeeded in most ways. However, the truth of the matter is that a lot of people mocked the look of the Green Goblin’s costume for good reason. That said, you have to respect the people that crafted the Goblin’s look as they clearly put a lot of work into it. In fact, it was made up of 580 different pieces.
14 Hard Times
Without a doubt the most iconic scene from the original Spider-Man trilogy of films, Spidey’s upside-down kiss with Mary Jane sent the audience’s hearts aflutter. On the other hand, for actor Tobey Maguire, filming that moment sent him coughing and choking. That is the case because being upside down as water rained down on him led to his sinuses quickly filling with liquid over and over again.
13 Heavy Toll
When it came time to design the look of The Amazing Spider-Man 2’s Green Goblin, the decision was made to have actor Dane DeHaan wear both a heavy suit and prosthetics. Unfortunately, his scenes were shot in 46 degrees Celsius weather which led to him telling Vanity Fair that his “brain was melting”. In fact, after only one day of filming, DeHaan lost seven pounds.
12 Broken Knuckles
During the filming of a scene from Spider-Man 3, Thomas Haden Church was instructed to punch a specific brick as it had been replaced with a fake one that wouldn’t injure his hand. Unfortunately for the actor, a huge mistake was made as the replacement brick hadn’t been installed yet so during the first take, Church punched a real brick, breaking three knuckles in the process.
11 Nearly Flattened Foot
During a memorable scene from The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Peter Parker completely obliviously crosses a street in order to see Gwen Stacy. As it turns out, a taxi that drove by at one point clipped the heel of one of actor Andrew Garfield’s feet which he called “really scary”. Where was his Spidey sense when he needed it?
10 Close Call Cameo
When most casual Marvel fans think of the word Captain, they are bound to envision either Steve “Captain America” Rogers or Carol “Captain Marvel” Danvers. However, big fans of the company know all about Captain Britain, a superhero from the comics that unsurprisingly hails from England. What we never realized is that due to Far From Home’s European locale, Captain Britain nearly appeared in the movie.
9 Fantastic Attention to Detail
During Spider-Man: Far From Home, Peter Parker and his classmates travel to Europe on an international flight. In a stroke of genius, the people that worked on the film made sure that the in-flight movies were tailored to the history of the MCU. For example, eagle-eyed viewers of the film could see there were documentaries about Wakanda, Hydra, The Snap, and Tony Stark available to watch during the flight.
8 Stunt Performers
As any movie fan knows, Hollywood employs stunt performers in order to ensure the safety of the stars that headline films. Despite that, during the production of Spider-Man 2 Tobey Maguire performed many of his own stunts while Alfred Molina was more than happy to have someone step in for him. Remarkably enough, however, Rosemary Harris, the actor who played Aunt May, performed stunts even at her advanced age.
7 Hero Hopeful
Principally known as a pop singer, some people may not realize it but Michael Jackson also tried his hand at acting several times during his life. In addition to the roles he took, Stan Lee revealed to Moviefone that Jackson “wanted to be Spider-Man” so he lobbied the Marvel legend for the part.
6 Old Aunt May
When word broke that the MCU’s version of Aunt May was going to be portrayed by Marisa Tomei, fans were shocked that someone so young would play the character. Not alone in that regard, Tomei herself has revealed she was shocked once she learned how old the character she was cast as typically is. In fact, she worried producers thought of her as being that old.
5 Interesting Inspiration
During The Amazing Spider-Man, Peter Parker gains powers after he is bitten by a radioactive spider when he walks into a “web harvesting room”. Since the scene includes no dialogue, actor Andrew Garfield asked director Marc Webb to play music on set to help him get into the mood of the scene. Funnily enough, the song he asked to be played was “Pure Imagination” from the movie Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
4 Foreseen Casting
Already an extremely respected actor by the time he was hired to play The Amazing Spider-Man 2’s version of the Rhino, Paul Giamatti was still heavily criticized for his take on the character. That must have been a big disappointment to the actor, as he was asked which comic book character he would like to play during a 2011 appearance on Conan O’Brien and he replied Rhino.
3 Disaster Strikes
Despite the fact that Sam Raimi shot as many scenes for the first Spider-Man movie as he could on New York City Streets, most of the film’s action sequences were filmed on massive sets. Sadly, during the construction of one of them, catastrophe hit when a forklift fell which led to the untimely demise of welder Tim Holcombe.
2 Cameo Shoot
Just like a long list of other movies, Spider-Man: Homecoming featured a cameo from comic book legend Stan Lee. However, due to his increased age at that time, Lee couldn’t be trotted out each time a Marvel movie was filmed so he never appeared on Homecoming’s set. Instead, director James Gunn filmed four Stan Lee cameos in one day, including Homecoming’s, on the set of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2.
1 A Very Different Take
As is the case with most big-budget films, prior to making the first Spider-Man movies, many writers were given the chance to write their own script about the character for Sony. For example, one writer’s “Spider-Man” script focused on Peter Parker being experimented on by a mad scientist that turned him into a violent human tarantula with eight legs.
Sources: moviefone.com, factinate.com, babbletop.com, screenrant.com