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Spider-Man: Brand New Day director Destin Daniel Cretton has revealed a sticky Marvel supervillain who was originally set to feature in the movie.
Cretton planned for Marvel’s classic glue-shooting baddie Paste-Pot Pete to appear as part of the movie’s introductory montage. It’s here we see Spidey fighting villains such as Scorpion, Boomerang and Tombstone — and it’s clear that more enemies were once planned.
One of these enemies would have been Peter Petruski, better known as Paste-Pot Pete, who first debuted in Marvel comics back in 1962. Created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby, the character has tangled with Spider-Man and the Fantastic Four over the years, and briefly been a part of teams such as the Frightful Four and the Sinister Six.
How are we getting things like Aquaman 2 and El Muerto before we get what fans really want? Paste Pot Pete: The Movie. pic.twitter.com/gD4cZixsVL— Comic Tropes (@CTropes) April 27, 2022
In terms of his abilities, Pete shares some similarity to Tom Holland’s Spider-Man by firing a sticky adhesive (initially from a glue gun, but later from wrist-mounted devices), allowing him to shoot ropes and webs, and walk on walls. It remains to be seen how well he would have matched up to Holland himself — particularly as the latter’s organic web skills develop.
“We played around with a lot of villains who didn’t make it into the final cut in the end,” Cretton told OutNow. “We looked at the different [comic book] covers and considered which ones could help us tell our story.
“We wanted to show how Spider-Man cleans up the city, meaning beating up enemies. But on many covers, Spider-Man is currently getting a beating himself – so for the most part, we couldn’t use those. Many classic Spidey pose covers were also unusable for us. One character we had a lot of fun with and wanted to include in the film was Pace Pop Pete – but he didn’t quite make it in.”
Still, perhaps there’s hope for Paste-Pot Pete in Spider-Man 5? While Tom Holland’s return has not been formally announced by Marvel, his future seems secure following Brand New Day’s record–breaking opening weekend in theaters that brought in an astonishing $927 million worldwide.
“Spider-Man: Brand New Day sees Destin Daniel Cretton effectively refocus on the sturdiest pillars of the webslinger’s iconography: struggling to find balance while swinging around New York City saving the day, and looking dang cool doing it,” we wrote in IGN’s Spider-Man: Brand New Day review, which returned a 7/10 score. Maybe with Paste-Pot Pete, it could have better stuck the landing?
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky@tomphillipseg.bsky.social
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