In the realm of comic books, a hero is often only as good as their villains, and there is arguably no Marvel hero who has better villains than Spider-Man. The Web-Slinger's rogues gallery is equaled only by Batman's iconic foes, so with each new Spider-Man movie, there is always a lot of excitement as to which villains will show up. Later this year sees the release of the animated film Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, which is looking to have no shortage of villains. Squaring off with Miles Morales in the film will be the Kingpin, the Prowler and the Ultimate version of the Green Goblin.
CinemaBlend's own Sean O'Connell attended the CinemaCon panel where the footage from Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse was shown. In the footage, Miles Morales is seen facing off against these three foes. These are some interesting choices, as they range from well known to obscure, and the animated film is an opportunity to bring these villains to life in a different way that will hopefully take advantage of the freedom of the animated medium.
The Kingpin is one of those Marvel villains who is mostly known as being Daredevil's arch-nemesis, but he has mixed it up with Spider-Man plenty of times over the years as well. His last outing on the big screen saw him being portrayed by the late Michael Clarke Duncan in the Ben Affleck-led Daredevil movie. More recently, Vincent D'Onofrio's portrayal on the Daredevil Netflix series has earned a lot of praise.
The Prowler is a fun choice because he has not shown up as a villain in any of Sony's live-action films, so he will be new to most audiences. In the Ultimate comics, his real identity is Aaron Davis, the uncle of Miles Morales. This character was actually played by Donald Glover in Spider-Man: Homecoming. In Into the Spider-Verse he will be a different version of the Prowler whose real name is Hobart Brown, which is undoubtedly a reference Hobie Brown, who is The Prowler in the main Marvel universe. There was actually a quick glimpse of what appears to be the Prowler in the first teaser trailer for Into the Spider-Verse (as seen at the top of the page), and he was wearing a bright purple costume just like in the comics.
Miles Morales took on the role of Spider-Man in Marvel's Ultimate line of comic books back in 2011, and Into the Spider-Verse will be drawing from the Ultimate books for the villains as well. The Green Goblin who shows up in this film will be the Ultimate Green Goblin, who is still Norman Osborn, but is less evil green elf and more huge demonic Piccolo from Dragonball. Green Goblin is probably Spider-Man's most well known and iconic villain, having shown up in both the Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire films, but this gives him another opportunity to show up in a much different way. It's tough to say whether or not the Ultimate Green Goblin would translate in live action, but the fun animation style of Into the Spider-Verse should allow the filmmakers to really go all out with the character.
It was also confirmed at CinemaCon that Jake Johnson will voice Peter Parker in the film. He joins Liev Schreiber, Shameik Moore, Brian Tyree Henry and Mahershala Ali. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse swings into theaters on December 14.
