As rumours continue to swirl about Spider-Man: Brand New Day's villains, all we really know is that the wall-crawler will need to contend with The Scorpion, The Punisher, and The Hulk (which should be more than enough to keep Peter Parker busy next summer).
Tarantula, Boomerang, Ramrod, and Tombstone are said to be among the bad guys set to appear in the movie, but just how big will their roles be? The Cosmic Circus has chimed in today, starting by confirming that Mister Negative will not appear in Spider-Man: Brand New Day.
"The idea behind the multiple side villains that we’re seeing reported by multiple scoopers isn’t because scoopers are confused," the site explains. "A good majority of those villains being reported are meant to be a part of an opening montage similar to The Fantastic Four: First Steps, where we would see Spider-Man take on these villains over the years since No Way Home."
It's added that, "We’ll see how with each passing battle, Peter would upgrade his suit, reaching the one we see in Brand New Day."
That should help establish Spider-Man as a street-level superhero, and likely leaves the door open to us seeing more of those villains in future movies. Who will play them has yet to be revealed, though we'd bet on the trades sharing casting news in the coming weeks as production continues.
As for who the rest of this next MCU trilogy, the names being thrown around are The Kingpin, Venom, Tombstone, Hammerhead, and Prowler.
The prevailing theory is that Mac Gargan will serve as the MCU's Venom, skipping over Eddie Brock and giving The Scorpion a shot at revenge after he's inevitably beaten in Spider-Man: Brand New Day. That's likely a story for Spider-Man 5, after Peter brings the alien costume back to Earth after Avengers: Secret Wars, though there could be a twist.
Spider-Man: No Way Home left a piece of the Venom franchise's Symbiote on Earth 616, and the site teases, "The symbiote does belong to another universe, so the more time it spends on Earth-616, the more the boundaries between the universes cause friction against each other until they break."
It feels like there's a lot of guesswork going on here, but even if only some of this is true, Spider-Man: Brand New Day is shaping up to be a thrilling fresh start for the webbed wonder in the MCU...
Spider-Man: Brand New Day shares a title with a controversial era of storytelling, which, thanks to a deal with Mephisto, saw the wall-crawler get a fresh start when his marriage to Mary Jane Watson ended and his identity became secret again. He faced many new sinister foes during that time and was surrounded by an overhauled supporting cast, including a resurrected Harry Osborn.
Mister Negative, Jackpot, Menace, and Carlie Cooper were some of the standout additions to his world, though they don't currently look set to appear in the movie. Instead, all signs point to Spidey teaming up with (and at some point fighting) The Punisher to take on a Savage Hulk, with The Scorpion thrown in for good measure.
We recently published a feature about how the "Brand New Day" comics could influence the next Spider-Man movie, along with a breakdown of every villain rumoured to appear (there are lots of sinister possibilities).
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings helmer Destin Daniel Cretton directs Spider-Man: Brand New Day from a script by Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers. Tom Holland leads a cast that also includes Jon Bernthal, Mark Ruffalo, Zendaya, Sadie Sink, Michael Mando, and Liza Colón-Zayas.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day will be released in theaters on July 31, 2026.