Spider-Man reboot to feature characters from the MCU

When Spider-Man enters the Marvel Cinematic Universe next month, he’s going to meet a lot of new faces. Wouldn’t it be cool if Spidey invited some of them over to his house? That’s apparently going to happen, according to Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige, confirming rumors suggesting Captain America and Iron Man could appear in the web slinger’s upcoming solo movie.

“He is in the universe now, and the fun of the universe is that characters go back and forth,” Feige said.

Sure, okay, Feige doesn’t get very specific, but it’s confirmation that Spider-Man won’t be alone when his standalone film comes out in 2017. Marvel has utilized its universe to good effect over the past few years by crossing characters over into solo movies; Black Widow was in Captain America: The Winter Soldier, War Machine was in Iron Man, etc., etc. We’re going to see much more of that in the future, allowing Marvel to establish these characters even more heading into Avengers: Infinity War.

Now, just because other characters do show up in the Spider-Man movie doesn’t mean they’ll have prominent roles. Marvel is in the precarious position of rebooting the character, so they don’t want him to get overshadowed. However, having familiar characters from the MCU appear in Spidey’s film is the easiest way to differentiate it from the others, and a perfect opportunity to endear the character among characters fans have seen onscreen for years now.