Nobody outside of the vocal fanbase was expecting Spider-Man: No Way Home to land a Best Picture nomination at the Academy Awards, but that didn’t stop them from voicing their displeasure that it didn’t anyway.
The sixth highest-grossing movie of all-time could only muster a solitary nod for Best Visual Effects, but at least Andrew Garfield managed to make the Best Actor shortlist for a second time, and there’s a distinct possibility the Tick, Tick… Boom! star could end up walking away with the trophy.
It’s an incredibly stacked field packed with big names, though, and Garfield is up against some stellar competition in the form of King Richard‘s Will Smith, The Tragedy of Macbeth‘s Denzel Washington, The Power of the Dog‘s Benedict Cumberbatch, and Being the Ricardos‘ Javier Bardem.
Naturally, one of the first things Garfield was asked by The Hollywood Reporter after the Oscar contenders were announced related to his web-slinging return being almost completely shut out of the conversation, and he was every bit as diplomatic as you’d expect.
“I’m not able to comment on that, particularly. I really love that movie and I really love Amy [Pascal] and Jon Watts and Kevin [Feige] and, obviously Tom [Holland], and Zendaya and Jacob [Batalon] and Tobey [Maguire] and all the cast. That movie has been a kind of juggernaut of proportions that I don’t think any of us really expected.
I can only speak for myself and I just feel grateful to be a part of something that is keeping cinemas alive right now, keeping cinemas full, and helping in that regard and making sure that the live experience or the communal experience of going to the movies remains intact. It’s very, very cool to see audiences still deeply longing for the thing that I know that we’re all deeply longing for. I think Spider-Man is obviously one of those movies right now and that’s so cool, and I’m so, so grateful to be a part of that.”
On the plus side, Garfield and No Way Home co-star Cumberbatch landed nominations, and the multiversal extravaganza is still arguably the most talked-about movie on the planet, even if it was deemed unworthy of consideration for anything other than the top-tier CGI.