As great as Spider-Man: Homecoming was, and it really was an excellent film and the perfect first solo outing for the iconic character in the MCU, it did leave out a few key elements of Peter Parker’s story. Among the many things that were omitted was probably his most well known love interest: Gwen Stacy.
Granted, we had just seen Emma Stone bring the character to life in The Amazing Spider-Man movies, and with Marvel wanting to do something fresh and different for Homecoming, it makes sense that they didn’t head down that path. However, Stacy is a hugely important character and the studio clearly knows that, which is why they’re now planning to introduce her in the currently untitled sequel.
According to a report from Omega Underground, an audition tape has surfaced which shows a French actress auditioning for the role. This would seem to indicate that the House of Ideas may be playing around with Gwen’s origins for the MCU, much like they did with Mary Jane. Though not confirmed, the outlet says she may be an exchange student at Peter’s school, which would certainly be an interesting twist, and already fans are speculating that a love triangle will spring up between her, Peter and MJ.
There’s also the fact that in the comics, we have Spider-Gwen (an alternate-reality version of Gwen), who’s extremely popular and a character people have wanted to see on the big screen for a while now. Could the studio be planting the seeds for her to appear in a future Homecoming sequel, then? It’s possible, but until we get some kind of firm confirmation on this, we’ll file that in the speculation cabinet.
It’ll likely stay there for a while, too, as we don’t expect to learn much more about the project for some time, given how busy Marvel’s upcoming slate is. Still, we do know that the as-yet-untitled sequel to Spider-Man: Homecoming is currently earmarked for a release on July 5th, 2019. It’ll be the first film to emerge from the ashes of Avengers 4 (May 3rd, 2019), too, and at that point, we’ll surely have a better idea of what to expect from Phase 4 of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.