The Russo Bros. Explain How Spider-Man Is Different in CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR
We have yet to see what directors Joe and Anthony Russo have planned for Spider-Man in Captain America: Civil War. I’m personally excited to see what his costume is going to look like, but while we wait for that, ComicBook.com conducted an interview with the directors, and they offered up some thoughts and details on Spider-Man and how he is going to be different from any other version of the character.
They were asked if we would see what Spider-Man looks before the movie is released in theaters. Anthony said that they couldn’t comment on it, and Joe added:
“Part of making these movies is maintaining surprise so that everybody's excited and that's one we're going to make fans surprised.”
They went on to offer some information on Tom Holland’s version of the character and how it will be different from Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield’s version of the superhero. Joe said:
“We took a very personal approach to the character. He was my favorite character growing up, so the opportunity to bring Spider-Man to the screen is a dream come true. It's something that I spent a lot of time thinking about as a kid. We had thought back to the things that excited us about him as a character when we were younger, and one of the most important components of that was that he's a high schooler burdened with incredible powers and responsibility. That really differentiates him from every other character in the Marvel universe as opposed to other superheroes. For us, it was extremely important that we cast somebody very close to the age of a high school student. The previous films had adults playing a high schooler. We wanted more of an authenticity to the casting. We were very specific about that. We wanted an energy and charisma from the character, an energy, but also an insecurity that would make him fun to watch in contrast to the confident superheroes.
"It was also important to us that the actor that was cast feel contemporary because the other films that portrayed where he lived is more... they honored the comic books in terms of the choices. But you go look at the home that Tobey Maguire lived in in Raimi’s Spider-Man was... those were very expensive homes. We wanted to relate it to the reality…”
They directors went on to explain that the loved the “everyman appeal” of the character, and Joe talked about taking a realistic approach to bringing the character to life:
“A character growing up with his aunt in New York, a single income family… Where would they live? What would that look like? Where could they afford to live? We asked ourselves all those questions. We try to take a very logical and realistic and naturalistic approach to the character. Again, in combination those are all of the things that we try to do, and of course, to bring our own touches, too.”
Anthony then commented on tone they are taking with the character and how he will fit in the Marvel Cinematic Universe:
“I would also add, again, we're introducing this character in a Captain America movie. If you look at what we did with Winter Soldier with the Cap character in terms of bringing him into the modern world, trying to ground the movie tonally into something that was a step toward real-world, at least to the degree you can do that in a superhero movie, that's still the tonal universe that we're playing in in Civil War. We're bringing a character… we're bringing Spider-Man into the movie in that universe, now, in that specific tonal stylistic world. I think underscoring everything Joe was saying about your question in terms of how were we thinking about the character in relation to past interpretations of the character, part of our choices were all so colored by the specifics of the world what we were playing in with these two Captain America movies, meaning Winter Soldier and Civil War. It's a very specific tonal world. It's a little more grounded and a little more hard-core contemporary. That was also coloring our choices a lot about the character on Spider-Man.”
The Russos went on to talk about their fandom, and how they grew up with these characters and why they were so important to them. It’s their love for these characters that made them want to bring the to life on the big screen in the greatest ways possible. Joe concluded with:
“I want to be clear. We're not trying to denigrate other interpretations of Spider-Man. Raimi's movies are fantastic. Spider-Man one and two are amazing. Two, is one of if not my favorite comic book movie of all time. But he made a very strong choice with those movies from a color palate standpoint to a costume standpoint, execution standpoint, camerawork standpoint to honor the feeling of the comic book. We're trying to honor the feeling of naturalism and to honor the feeling of reality. The harder we can pull these characters into reality, the better for us, especially because we're all so connected now through social media, the Internet. We're all so dialed in to what's happening in current events. That it's important for us that these characters live in the world that we live in because it makes them more real and it makes our experience of watching them more passionate and more well-rounded.”
I have complete faith in that these directors and Marvel will be able to give us one of the best versions of Spider-Man that has been brought to the big screen!