Editor's note: This article contains spoilers for Spider-Man: No Way Home. After spending the better part of 2021 denying any involvement with Spider-Man: No Way Home, actor Andrew Garfield has started 2022 by admitting that he’d be open to playing his version of the Marvel superhero again. He told Variety in a new interview that the character is “all about service,” and that he was “really grateful” for being able to return “to tie up some loose ends.”

Garfield originally played Peter Parker/Spider-Man in two films—The Amazing Spider-Man and The Amazing Spider-Man 2—directed by Marc Webb. Plans for a third movie were scrapped after the second one underperformed both critically and commercially. Subsequently, Sony struck a unique deal with Marvel Studios that would enable Spider-Man (and several Spidey-adjacent characters) to appear in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. But, with the success of No Way Home and his appearance as a multiverse Peter Parker, Garfield spoke to Variety about the possibility of returning to play Spider-Man again in another solo film:

“I mean, yes, definitely open to something if it felt right. Peter and Spider-Man, those characters are all about service, to the greater good and the many. He’s a working-class boy from Queens that knows struggle and loss and is deeply empathetic. I would try to borrow Peter Parker’s ethical framework in that, if there was an opportunity to step back in and tell more of that story, I would have to feel very sure and certain in myself.”

In Spider-Man: No Way Home, three generations of the character are united on screen to face common enemies, after a mishap with Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) and Tom Holland's Peter tears open the multiverse. This allowed Garfield’s version of Spider-Man to join forces with Holland and Tobey Maguire’s Spideys after being pulled through portals by Ned Leeds (Jacob Batalon).

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Image via Netflix

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Thematically, No Way Home includes several moments which almost make it seem as if Garfield’s Spider-Man has unresolved trauma, notably the scene where he leaps to the rescue of MJ (Zendaya) after she falls from a building, in a beat that mirrors a similar one in The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Garfield told Variety:

“I am so grateful. I’m just really, really grateful that I got to tie up some loose ends for the Peter that I was playing. I love that character and I’m grateful that I got to work with these incredible actors, this incredible director, and Marvel in conjunction with Sony. It was joyful, and a feeling of closure for me. There was so many unanswered questions for my Peter, where we left it. I got to step back in and get some healing for him. And also really supporting [Holland’s] Peter, and honoring his character completing that trilogy, not distracting or detracting from it.”

No Way Home is by far the most successful Spider-Man film that Garfield (or any other actor) has been involved with. Directed by Jon Watts and also featuring returning actors Alfred Molina, Willem Dafoe, Marisa Tomei, Jon Favreau, Jamie Foxx and Thomas Haden Church, No Way Home has broken several pandemic-era records, and has crossed the $600 million mark at the domestic box office.

Spider-Man: No Way Home is playing in theaters now.