The Spider-Man franchise has reached a new level with the release of Madame Web. The newly-released film, which is currently facing negative reviews, has finally hit theaters. Now fans are discussing the project and how exactly it fits into Sony’s bigger picture for the Spider-Man brand. While those details are still unclear, it does look like footage from Spider-Man 2 was used in Madame Web.
Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 2, released two decades ago in 2024, is often recognized as one of the greatest superhero movies ever made. As such, it can be quite disappointing for fans that didn’t enjoy Madame Web to find a film that doesn’t quite live up to its more successful predecessors. Interestingly, however, the film does keep some loose ties with Sam Raimi‘s trilogy.
As mentioned, these ties are mostly in the form of recycled Spider-Man 2 footage and one character that looks bizarrely similar to the thug that was previously believed to have killed Uncle Ben in Sam Raimi’s first Spider-Man film. Fans can see this pointed out in a series of X posts shared below.
Of course, it’s not exactly possible for Madame Web to take place in the same universe as Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man trilogy. Madame Web takes place in the unique year 2003. This is unique because it doesn’t exactly allow Mary Parker’s baby to be any version of Peter Parker we’ve known so far. Unless, of course, they just don’t care about timelines adding up at this point.
Here are the posts which feature the footage from Spider-Man 2 and the comparison with Madame Web:
Context: Madame Web reused a shot from Spider-Man 2 (2004). The photo on the left is from Madame Web, the clip on the right is from Spider-Man 2 https://t.co/I0L3Oi8jTm pic.twitter.com/rWIOeJerIB
— Tom Smith (@Tom_Smith717) February 16, 2024
Fans are no doubt fascinated by Sony’s creative decisions with the Spider-Man franchise so far, and we’ll have to see what plans they have following the release of Madame Web. Stay tuned to ScreenGeek for any additional updates as we have them. In the meantime, Madame Web is currently playing in theaters.