Why This Crucial Character Is Missing From Sony’s Latest ‘Spider-Man’ Production

Sony’s latest Spider-Man will look very different from his predecessors.

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Few super-heroes are as recognizable as Spider-Man. The character’s red and blue costume with its big black and white bug-like eyes has appeared in every show and movie about the wall crawler. Until now.

In a bid to beat super-hero fatigue following a deluge of films over decades, Sony Pictures Television has produced Spider-Noir, a fresh spin on Spider-Man which was released yesterday on Amazon’s Prime Video and MGM+ platforms.

Set in an edgy alternate-reality 1930s New York City, the streaming series has a black and white viewing option for authenticity. However, even its color version doesn’t feature the web spinner’s trademark suit and that’s not all. Unlike all the other live-action Spider-Man productions, its hero’s real name isn’t even Peter Parker and there is good reason for this.

Spider-Man wasn’t created by Sony but was instead the brainchild of writer-editor Stan Lee and artist Steve Ditko of Marvel Comics which is now owned by Disney. As this report explained, Sony acquired film and television rights to Spider-Man in 1998 when Marvel fell on hard times. The terms governing the use of the character are set out in a 71-page license agreement executive summary which was released in a 2014 hack of Sony Pictures Entertainment.

The document covers everything from Marvel’s approval process for each picture, their minimum budget and the number of screens they have to play on right down to Spider-Man’s powers, costumes and even his character traits. It states that amongst his key attributes are that he “does not use foul language beyond PG-13” and “does not abuse alcohol”, both of which are in abundance in Spider-Noir.

The eight-episode show follows Ben Reilly, a washed up private investigator, played by Nicolas Cage, who spends his days drowning away his sorrows in bars. In an interview with Empire magazine, executive producers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller even described him as someone who is “not afraid to punch a guy in the face drunkenly.”

In classic film noir style, Reilly is a former World War I veteran who comes across a military experiment on a mysterious spider while serving in Germany. When the spider bites Reilly it alters his physiology giving him classic Spider-Man powers including the ability to climb walls, sense danger and shoot black webbing from spinneret holes in his wrists.

It also gives him bone-cracking, involuntary contortions which Reilly describes in the show as “ticks”. The portrayal of them leans heavily into body horror and, combined with the profanity, drinking and violence, contributes to Spider-Noir getting a TV-14 rating rather than the PG-13 of all of Sony’s Spider-Man movies. That’s far from the only difference between them.

In the Sony films and Marvel comics, the death of Spider-Man’s Uncle Ben convinces Parker to become a hero but in Spider-Noir, Reilly gives up the role following his failure to save the love of his life, Ruby. He is spurred to take it up again to deal with the rise of super-powered villains and, in-keeping with his day-job as a PI, Reilly dons a trench coat and a fedora for his exploits.

To protect his identity he wears a woolen mask with big circular bug eyes sewn into it which light up like torches. It gives the character’s face a similar look to Spider-Man but, crucially he doesn’t go by that name to ensure Sony stays within the terms of its contract. Instead, he is known as The Spider while Reilly’s name comes from a storyline in the comics where he is a clone of Peter Parker.

Spider-Noir’s co-showrunner Oren Uziel stressed to Empire that the hero isn’t the same character as the one which appeared in the 2018 Oscar-winning animated movie, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, even though he wore the same costume and was also voiced by Cage. “Same character, different universe,” he explained. “It’s a different flavor of that character, even though it’s still Nick’s voice. It’s not a continuation of Into The Spider-Verse.”

In the animated movie, the character’s real name is Peter Parker but by changing it to Reilly in the live-action series, the showrunners could cast off his kid-friendly ‘boy scout’ attributes. It also gave Cage more freedom with his performance and he has confessed that he modeled it 70% on Humphrey Bogart’s gritty gumshoe roles and 30% on Bugs Bunny.

Fans won’t have to wait long to see the traditional version of Spider-Man as Tom Holland will be playing him again on the silver screen in July’s highly-anticipated Spider-Man: Brand New Day. Cage is also expected to voice the web-head one more time in 2027 animated sequel Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse. Amazon has yet to renew the live-action Spider-Noir for a second season but it may not be long before it does as the first series has been awarded a 91% rating by critics on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes.

If audiences like it enough to justify a second season then Reilly really will start to get into the swing of things and, ironically, could even have more staying power than Spider-Man himself.