Spider-Man: Brand New Dayis now a massive success, earning over two billion at the worldwide box office (and counting) and becoming the highest-grossing film of 2026. Now that Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios are breathing easy about their $225 million investment, the cast, crew, and creative team behind No Way Homecan speak up more about making the film and reveal alternate versions that almost made it to the screen.
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We’ve heard from Tom Holland about versions of Brand New Daythat had Man-Spider in it; learned that Rosario Dawson’s Claire Temple almost made her Marvel Cinematic Universe debut, and now we’re starting to learn more about the alternate villain ideas that were considered.
Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers wrote the screenplay for Spider-Man: Brand New Day, and have now graduated to working on Avengers: Doomsday and Secret Wars. McKenna recently appeared on Jeff Goldsmith’s podcast The Q&A, and revealed that they had once considered the classic Spider-Man villain Chameleon for Brand New Day. The MCU flip on Chameleon would’ve seen the villain using mind control as his means of “disguising” himself – an idea which ultimately became the role Jean Grey (Sadie Sink) plays in the final version of the film. The only problem with Chameleon was that he was already being used in another Sony project: the Spider-Man spinoff film, Kraven the Hunter.
“We were going, ‘Well, Chameleon, but how do you do that?’ Well, they’ve done Skrulls. You’re not going to do masks. How do we do that? And then we hit upon the idea of mind control. What if Chameleon was using mind control? But then they had already used Kraven’s half-brother in Kraven. So it was like, ‘You can’t do Chameleon.’ But that’s what got us on the path of mind control. And then mind control eventually led to us getting who was the perfect character for that role, who was Jean Grey. But that was a journey.”
In retrospect, using a villain like a Chameleon would’ve created a far less powerful and impactful story for Spider-Man: Brand New Day. By using Jean Grey, Marvel fans got a legitimate emotional and thematic bridge to the MCU version of The X-Menthat’s coming in 2028. At the same time, Brand New Day creates a powerful portrait of Peter Parker/Spider-Man’s world and character by holding it up to the loneliness and angst a young mutant like Jean feels, while also painting a bold new portrait of Jean Grey, shaped by her encounter with Spider-Man. That’s two major Marvel franchises getting bolstered by one film, and a much-needed reaffirmation that the characters and events of the MCU are truly interconnected.
As for Chameleon: Kraven the Hunter‘s final scene teased a greater arc to come from the villain, who was played by Fred Hechinger (The White Lotus, Fear Streettrilogy). Unfortunately, Kravennot only crashed and burned at the box office ($62million on a budget of over $110 million), but it also crashed so hard that it killed the entire Spider-Man spinoff universe. The teaser scene with Dmitri Kravinoff (Hechinger) revealing himself as “Chameleon” has become a viral meme, with Marvel fans mocking the character’s look and the entire cringe nature of Kraven. Needless to say, there’s no real reason for any filmmaker to even think of dusting off a D-level villain like Chameleon anytime soon, or maybe ever again.
Spider-Man: Brand New Dayis now in theaters.
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