Marvel’s Kevin Feige talks Spider-Man reboot and Doctor Strange

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

Marvel head honcho Kevin Feige shared some interesting new details on the SPIDER-MAN reboot and Scott Derrickson's DOCTOR STRANGE while speaking with Birth.Movies.Death at the ANT-MAN press junket, and I think you guys are really going to dig what he has to say about both projects.

We'll start with SPIDER-MAN. Last week it was announced THE IMPOSSIBLE actor Tom Holland will be playing the web-slinger for director Jon Watts, and Feige says he wants the film to be similar to a John Hughes movie.

It’s the soap opera in high school, and those supporting characters, that are interesting. Just as we hadn’t seen a heist movie in a long time, or a shrinking movie in a long time, we haven’t seen a John Hughes movie in a long time. Not that we can make a John Hughes movie – only John Hughes could – but we’re inspired by him, and merging that with the superhero genre in a way we haven’t done before excites us…Particularly at that age, in high school, everything feels like life or death. The tests feel like life or death. Coming home from being out with your friends seemed like life or death.

Feige has some good news for those of you who are sick of Green Goblin. He was asked if the reboot will use villains from the previous Spidey flicks, and his response was "Right now we’re interested in seeing villains we haven’t seen before." However, there is some bad news: it doesn't sound like Spider-Man and Daredevil will be teaming up anytime soon on Marvel's Netflix series.

My general answer to that is never say never. But our current Sony deal is very specific – we’re producing the standalone film, with a certain amount of back and forth allowed.

Now on to DOCTOR STRANGE. Marvel will be keeping Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum on Bleeker Street in Greenwich Village, and “He will be the strangest thing walking out onto that street.” Tilda Swinton is in negotiations to play The Ancient One, and Feige went on to talk about casting for the role.

As we were developing this film we looked at The Ancient One as a mantle more than a specific person. The sorcerers have been around for millennia, protecting us from things we didn’t know about until this story. There have been multiple [Ancient Ones], even if this one has been around for five hundred years, there were others. This is a mantle, and therefore felt we had leeway to cast in interesting ways.

Marvel isn't removing all of the phony Tibetan mysticism from the comics for the film, and Feige says Strange will leave New York in search of something and head east. Kevin Feige also says a scene at the end of ANT-MAN "represents the tip of the mind-bending weirdness we’re going to do in Strange." What are your thoughts on the latest SPIDER-MAN and DOCTOR STRANGE details?

DOCTOR STRANGE will be in theaters on November 4, 2016, and SPIDER-MAN is scheduled to be released on July 28, 2017.