Spider-Man: Kevin Feige Confirms Peter Parker; Talks High School

When word first surfaced that maybe Marvel Studios was in the process of working out a deal with Sony Pictures to bring Spider-Man into the MCU fold, many (myself included) balked at this as a pipe dream. There was no way Sony was going to give up its only comic book character in the midst of the superhero boom, especially to the most successful studio making superhero movies at the moment. But the impossible happened: a deal in which Sony retains ownership of Spider-Man, but shares the character with Marvel Studios for use in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with Marvel’s Kevin Feige overseeing things creatively.

A fair amount of the credit for pulling this deal off goes to Feige, so it’s no wonder that he’s got big plans for how to bring Spidey into the MCU fold. With rumors swirling that the character will make his first appearance in the about-to-start-filming Captain America: Civil War, casting is currently underway to find the new Spider-Man. Everyone’s got an opinion on who should play the new webslinger, but as Marvel and Sony started searching for the right actor, many began to wonder: will the new Spider-Man be Peter Parker, or could Marvel be going a different route and using someone like Miles Morales instead?

The initial press release regarding the Spider-Man deal name-dropped Peter Parker, but fans were still curious whether Marvel might be switching things up. Steve recently spoke with Feige at the press day for Avengers: Age of Ultron, and he not only set the record straight on who their Spider-Man is, but confirmed his age:

“In terms of the age of an actor we’ll eventually to cast, I don’t know. In terms of the age of what we believe Peter Parker is, I’d say 15-16 is right.”

So that settles that: the new Spider-Man will still be Peter Parker. But in terms of him being high school-age, we’ve been hearing for a while now that this was the age range Marvel was aiming for. Speaking with Steve, Feige explained why he’s eager to bring forth a Spider-Man that’s still in high school:

“We want to play with Spider-Man in the high school years because frankly there’ve been five Spider-Man films and the amazing thing about it is, even though there’ve been five Spider-Man films, there are so many things from the comics that haven’t been done yet. Not just characters or villains or supporting characters, but sides to his character. The most obvious being the ‘young, doesn’t quite fit in’ kid before his powers, and then the fella that puts on a mask and swings around and fights bad guys and doesn’t shut up, which is something we want to play with and we’re excited about.”

amazing-spider-man-movie-emma-stone-andrew-garfield — Image via Sony Pictures

Indeed, the minute word surfaced about the Marvel Spider-Man being high school-aged, it made sense as a foil for the rest of the established characters in the MCU:

“I think it was midway through the first film that he graduated high school. At the beginning of the second Marc Webb film, he graduated high school. And some of my favorite Spider-Man arcs and Spider-Man stories, he’s in high school for a lot of it. We want to explore that. That also makes him very, very different from any of our other characters in the MCU, which is something else we want to explore: how unique he is when now put against all these other characters.”

With filming on Civil War about to get underway and a standalone Spider-Man movie (produced by Feige) set for release on July 28, 2017, expect to hear casting news on that front sooner rather than later.

Look for more from our interview with Feige on Collider soon. For a refresher on all of Marvel's confirmed releases, see below. And for a catalog of all upcoming superhero movie release dates, click here.