Spider-Man: No Way Home brought back a raft of familiar faces from the Sam Raimi Spidey trilogy, not least Tobey Maguire himself. But while Willem Dafoe, Alfred Molina, and Thomas Haden Church (at least vocally) reprised their roles in the blockbuster threequel, the original Mary Jane Watson did not. In fact, it turns out the actress hasn’t even got around to watching the movie yet.
While speaking to People, Dunst admitted that she still hasn’t seen the Marvel/Sony co-production, even though she’s aware that her old co-star and on-screen love interest Maguire features in it. The Power of the Dog star has plans to catch up, though, as she thinks she might rope her young son, and burgeoning Spidey fan, into watching it with her.
“I haven’t. I’m sorry!” Dunst said. “I know I have to. I know [Tobey Maguire’s] in it and it’s such a huge surprise and everyone’s freaking out. I will. I’ll eventually watch it. You know, I’ll watch it with my son, because he’s starting to get into Spider-Man stuff. There’s, like, a little-kid version of Spider-Man that he watches, so maybe he’ll watch it with me.”
Though she’s yet to experience the film herself, Dunst went on to reflect on how she’s proud to be part of the Spider-Man legacy and appreciates how much Maguire, as well as the Amazing franchise’s Andrew Garfield, coming back to the Marvel universe means to people. She also made the point that seeing childhood favorites return hits extra hard these days, given the current global situation.
“It’s such a cool legacy to be a part of, and to be the first one and be a Spider-Man fan. I feel like that’s a really special thing because these fans have lived with these movies for so long and have grown up with it,” she continued. “It’s legacy things that feel really exciting. It’s nice to be excited about something. All of us are dealing with so much right now.”
Alongside the Spideys and the villains, it was also rumored for a while there that both Dunst and Emma Stone were set to reprise their roles as MJ and Gwen Stacy in No Way Home, too. Both actresses denied this was the case, however, in the run-up to its release, Dunst joked that if she did come back, she would be “an old MJ at this point with little Spidey babies.” As much as she was joking, seeing Maguire’s Parker and Dunst’s Watson starting a family together sounds like something the fans would really love.
Who knows, with Spider-Man: No Way Home being a phenomenal success, maybe Dunst will get the chance to reprise MJ, after all. Though she’d probably need to make sure she’s caught up with the film beforehand.