Some day, somehow, Tom Holland’s Spider-Man will share a screen with Tom Hardy’s Venom. How it’ll happen remains a mystery, though there’s a lot of hurdles to climb over first. Most obvious is that Spider-Man is currently a comfortable resident of the MCU while Venom lives one universe over in the (catchily named) Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters.
Marvel Studios have an agreement with Sony Pictures to use Spidey in the MCU, though this is on a short-term basis and with the rights always eventually reverting to Sony. Still, relations have thawed between the two companies and we’ve seen hints that Sony’s universe is at least aware of Spider-Man to some degree. Then, in the recent Venom: Let There Be Carnage trailer, there was a curious shot of a spider…
This all seems to be adding up to a long-awaited Spider-Man/Venom crossover and our sources are telling us that Marvel Studios head honcho Kevin Feige is masterminding the project. This makes sense, as we recently heard that Feige has been working very closely with the Sony team on Spider-Man: No Way Home, that he did uncredited consultation work on Venom, and that he helped mastermind the 2019 deal that saved the studios’ relationship.
Back in 2019 he said:
”[Spider-Man] also happens to be the only hero with the superpower to cross cinematic universes, so as Sony continues to develop their own Spidey-verse you never know what surprises the future might hold.”
So how and why might this happen? Though there were rumors that Holland’s Spider-Man would cameo in Venom: Let There Be Carnage I think the production schedules make that unlikely. However, Venom 3 is rumored to be adapting classic 90s arc ‘Maximum Carnage’, a story centered on the fractious bonds between Spider-Man, Venom, and Carnage and seems like a no-brainer for a movie adaptation.
With Spider-Man about to embark on a multiversal adventure in No Way Home the door is wide open for him to hop into another universe. Fingers crossed it happens soon.