Yahoo News What Far From Home could reveal about these classic supervillains
What with the details about the MCU’s future under lock and key following the events of Endgame, the July release of Spider-Man: Far From Home can’t come soon enough.
Set to wrap up Phase 3 while providing an insight into how the fallout of Endgame will affect the wider cinematic universe, Far From Home will also introduce us to a number of new characters.
One who’s been waiting in the wings is the supervillain Mysterio – or as he’s portrayed in the trailer, Peter Parker’s new ally (for now).
While the fishbowl-headed foe is the key hook, a number of B-list bad guys are revealed in the trailer for Peter to fight against alongside his new hero pal. Bad guys like Hydro-Man and Molten Man.
The story goes that Nick Fury recruits both Spider-Man and Mysterio to work together to take down these Earth-shattering destroyers, who are from another dimension named Earth-833.
Although they might not have been the first choice on the long list of enemies the webhead’s faced over the years, director Jon Watts explained why he thought they deserved some screen time.
“Because Mysterio is a hero in our world, I needed villains,“ he told Nerdist. “There’s so many Spider-Man villains from the rogues gallery that I wanted to dig a little bit deeper than what anyone might be expecting…
“Villains like Hydro-Man and Molten Man, who may not be on the highest list. But that opened up such amazing visual possibilities and poses really dangerous challenges for Spider-Man.”
So just who are these new fiends, and why are they so dangerous? Marvel Comics fans have the scoop already, and for those who aren’t into the books, that’s what you’ve got us for.
First up, let it be known that they’re not to be confused with The Elementals: four immortals who can control the elements and ruled the Earth thousands of years ago. Although they bear similarities, the MCU newbies are different beasts altogether.
Hydro-Man is seemingly the first man-turned-monster for Peter to face. The character initially appeared in the 1981 edition The Amazing Spider-Man #212. In comic-book lore, he started off as Morris Bench before he was accidentally knocked overboard a cargo ship by none other than the web-slinger himself.
A delightful combo of radiation and deep-sea bacteria (lovely) gave Morrie the ability to manipulate water and turn his body to liquid, using his new-found abilities to seek revenge on Spider-Man.
Another of the elemental evils set for Far From Home is Molten Man, a dude who, you guessed it, wields the power of fire. Initially a New Yorker named Mark Raxton, his greed led to an accident where he was covered in liquid metallic alloy from a radioactive meteor (as you do), which gave him superhuman strength and molten skin.
Eventually taking on the name Molten Man, he turned to crime to further his monetary gains and was confronted and overpowered by Spider-Man on numerous occasions, although the pair eventually sorted out their differences and became friends.
Finally, you’ve got Sandman. This fella started off as Flint Marko, a prison escapee who comes into contact and subsequently bonds with radioactive earth, giving him the ability to turn himself into sand. Like Molten Man, he too starts off as one of Spidey’s enemies, before eventually becoming a useful ally to Peter and the gang. (You might remember an iteration of him from the third Tobey Maguire Spider-Man movie.)
No news on who’s to represent air/wind, although executive producer Eric Carroll did reveal that they (or it) will show up to complete the squad.
“Yes. By the end of the movie, you get to get a taste of them all,” he said, “and we’ll let you guys do some of the theorising, but we did try to have them all be inspired by somebody actually from the comics.”
Some have suggested the air/wind/cloud villain could be Zephyr, the mistress of the winds who first appeared in the 1974 comic Supernatural Thrillers #8. Although this is highly doubtful considering the wind mistress is one of The Elementals and there’s not a lot of logic in introducing just one of those alongside a group of similarly themed supervillains.
We reckon it has something to do with Mysterio, aka Quentin Beck. As said, in the trailer he is portrayed as a hero, but in the books he’s a former movie special-effects wizard who uses his mastery of illusion to commit crimes.
Far From Home pitches Beck as the guy who teams up with Parker to take down these nature-fuelled nasties, but we suspect one of the twists will show the character as being more in line with his comic-book counterpart.
Could Mysterio be creating these elemental monsters so that he can show up and ‘defeat’ them, thus establishing himself as a superhero as cover for his criminal activities? While there’s no way of knowing for sure, this would mirror Mysterio’s first ever appearance in 1964's Amazing Spider-Man #13, in which he initially pretended to be a crime fighter in order to trick the general public.
If this does turn out to be the case, poor old Peter’s gonna have far more to deal with than your regular high school woes. Here’s hoping the skills he learned from Tony Stark are put to good use.
Spider-Man: Far from Home will be released on July 5.
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