The Russos weigh in on Spider-Man’s role in Civil War and his costume

Last Updated on July 31, 2021

Almost all the talk from the latest CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR trailer has been about how cool Black Panther is (valid point) and what the deal is with Spider-Man and his costume. Now it's time for the directors to weigh in, as Forbes recently caught up with Joe and Anthony Russo to discuss all things Marvel. As you can imagine, the topic of Spider-Man came up pretty quickly, and they had their fair share to say about the character, his role and especially his costume.

Spider-Man made an appearance at the end of the most recent Captain America: Civil War trailer. Did you always intend to put him in there or did you feel your hand forced by fans?

JR: We always intended to. He was my favorite character growing up, I still have my collection of comics in my closet so it was a dream come true for us to be able to have Spidey in the movie and interpret him as a character so we couldn’t be more excited and we wanted to share that with everybody else.

AR: Also I think it was a little bit of a correction because it was a very complicated deal that Sony had to work out with Marvel Studios and Disney in order to make that work. We were very quiet about Spider-Man’s involvement in the movie for much longer than we would have been. We were artificially silent on the character because it was such a sensitive business deal still being worked out even while we were shooting. We went through a very thorough casting process, we tested Tom Holland vigorously with Chris Evans and Robert Downey Jr,, we screen tested him along with several other actors, it was a very intense part of making Captain America: Civil War because he was an important part of the movie to us. Finally it’s all secure and we’re at a place where we can present him even in just a small taste.

JR: We thought it was a great way to reveal him. I think people are going to be happy with him in the movie, he’s got a very interesting role in it.

How big is that role?

JR: I think they’ll be happy.

AR: I’ll say this, part of the fun of Spider-Man is that this film is basically a war amongst the Avengers and Spidey does not have the baggage that all these other characters have. He enters the story after the conflict that is happening between the Avengers and that gives him a very unique place in the story.

There’s been a lot of talk about the Spider-Man costume as well, a mixed reaction. What is your response to that?

JR: The design of the costume is what it is. That’s the design that we love, it’s the design that Kevin Feige loves and so on. He’s a very popular character so it’s always going to be controversial, people are always going to love or hate what you do with him, but all we can do is make sure that we love it, that we are true to ourselves and true to how we feel about the character and then hope that everybody else digs it.

AR: Part of issue is that we gave such a small impression of the character in that trailer, it’s something of a Rorschach test where people can pour as much of their Spidey anxieties out but when they see the movie they are going to get a very big picture of a very complete character that they have never seen before. It’s kind of hard to react to people’s reactions but they will change radically when they see the movie.

JR: And there is still effects work that needs to be done on it.

I think the Russos make a good point about Spidey being a bit of a Rorschach, given how little of him we see in the trailer. Still, they've earned so much good will with WINTER SOLDIER that I think most people are giving them the benefit of the doubt. If CIVIL WAR is as strong a film as WINTER SOLDIER was, then fans are going to go nuts come time for the INFINITY WAR. Well…they'll probably do that anyway.

CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR hits theaters on May 6, 2016.