Sony and Marvel Studios have never revealed the specifics of the new agreement reached by both parties last year that saw Tom Holland’s Peter Parker remain as part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but based on recent developments, it would appear that the lines between each studio’s shared mythology will continue to be blurred.
The first installment in Sony’s SPUMC was a standalone story, with Venom deliberately avoiding any and all references to Spider-Man, but the debut trailer for Morbius made it pretty clear that things had changed. Not only was the web-slinger glimpsed in a background mural, but Homecoming villain Adrian Toomes showed up at the very end to seemingly hammer home the point that both franchises exist in the same narrative space.
Holland’s Spidey will inevitably appear in several Sony movies, but there’s also been plenty of speculation that the door will swing both ways, with Tom Hardy’s Venom frequently mentioned as a likely candidate for a crossover as well. Furthermore, tipster Mikey Sutton now claims that not only is Woody Harrelson’s Carnage reportedly getting his own R-rated spinoff, but he could end up facing off against several Marvel Studios-owned characters in the MCU, including Ghost Rider.
According to the tipster, Sony’s movies will technically exist within the Marvel Cinematic Universe but won’t have a direct effect on the continuity established by Kevin Feige over the last dozen years, and the plan is to have Carnage eventually cross paths and tangle with the Midnight Sons, a supernatural superhero team that’s also featured Doctor Strange, Blade, the Punisher, Moon Knight and many others in the comics.
Of course, a lot of this is dependent on both Venom: Let There Be Carnage matching the box office success of its predecessor and Harrelson’s performance as Kletus Kasady getting the sort of reception the studio are hoping for, neither of which can be guaranteed, but it certainly sounds like something that the fans would be into seeing happen.