The folks at Latino-Review.com are reporting Asa Butterfield (Hugo, Ender’s Game) has been cast as the new Spider-Man for Sony Pictures and will have his first appearance as the webslinger in next year’s Captain America: Civil War followed by a new Spider-Man feature in July 2017. Butterfield was reported as the front-runner back at the end of April and other than a brief report saying Tom Holland (“Wolf Hall,” The Impossible) was still in the mix that never changed.
Word is the new Spider-Man will keep Peter Parker a lot younger, a lot longer, focusing on his high school years and word is they plan to go with a tone matching that of a John Hughes (The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off).
Other names that were once on the short list of contenders for the Spidey role included Nat Wolff (Paper Towns, The Fault in Our Stars), Timothee Chalamet (Interstellar) and Liam James (The Way, Way Back, “The Killing”).
A shortlist of possible director contenders for the untitled Spider-Man project was Vacation reboot at Warner Bros. A notable name not on that list is Drew Goddard (The Cabin in the Woods), whom was once thought to be the director, though it appears that is no longer the case though he may still be attached as one of the film’s screenwriters.
I’m sure Butterfield’s casting will be confirmed sooner rather than later, but for those doubting the Latino-Review folks, just remember they were the first to report Brandon Routh as the new Superman and Heath Ledger as the Joker for The Dark Knight before anyone else. They do tend to get their ducks in a row before reporting casting of this size.
