How exactly does Sony’s Spider-Man Universe connect to the Marvel Cinematic Universe? That’s a question Marvel fans have been asking a lot in recent years. Are movies like Venom and Morbius set within the MCU, or are they taking place in their own, separate universe? The SMU/MCU relationship has only grown more confusing with the release of the first trailer for Venom: The Last Dance.
While we wait for the third (and possibly final) Venom movie to hit theaters, we figured it was time for a refresher on what we know about Sony’s Spider-Man Universe and how these movies connect to the larger tapestry that is the MCU. Why is there so much confusion and contradiction? Let’s break it down.
Spider-Man and the Marvel Movie Multiverse
Sony’s Spider-Man Universe has had a bizarre history so far. This is a universe populated by Spider-Man-adjacent characters like Eddie Brock, Madame Web and Morbius but with almost no trace of Spider-Man himself. The most we’ve gotten on that front comes in the Madame Web movie, where we see an infant Peter Parker being born in the early 2000s.
Presumably, that means there is a Spider-Man running around in the present-day timeline of Venom and Morbius, but we haven’t met him yet. More confusing is that the trailers for these movies have a habit of showing off Spider-Man and MCU Easter eggs that never materialize in the actual films. Most notably, Morbius’ trailer suggested the film was set in the MCU, after Spidey’s secret identity was leaked to the world in 2019’s Spider-Man: Far From Home. But in the final film, only the cameo of Michael Keaton’s Vulture serves as a link to the MCU.
2021’s Spider-Man: No Way Home crystallized the relationship between the SMU and MCU, confirming that they are indeed two separate universes that exist within the same multiverse. Tom Hardy’s Eddie Brock is briefly brought into the MCU by Doctor Strange’s spell, only to be thrust back into the SMU in the post-credits scene (though he does leave a piece of the Venom symbiote behind in the MCU). That also tracks with Vulture’s appearance in Morbius, as he too was presumably dragged into another universe by Strange’s spell.
In that sense, Sony’s Spider-Man universe is no different than the universe of Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man or Fox’s X-Men universe. They’re separate from the MCU, but still connected to it by the power of the multiverse. We may still see Hardy’s Venom and Tom Holland’s Spidey cross paths one day, particularly as Marvel Studios builds to the multiverse-spanning Avengers: Secret Wars.
Venom: The Last Dance’s Confusing Reveal
Though the connection between the SMU and MCU has been revealed at this point, Sony’s trailers still have a knack for muddying the waters. The trailer for Venom: The Last Dance has raised confusing new questions about the exact relationship between these two universes.
The trailer shows Chiwetel Ejiofor’s military character entering the bar where Eddie was drinking during his brief sojourn to the MCU, while Cristo Fernández again plays the bartender. Ejiofor’s character intercepts the symbiote fragment before it can escape, trapping it inside a glass.
This scene has already been the source of much confusion. Is it taking place in the MCU? Does this mean the symbiote won’t be making contact with Holland’s Peter Parker? And if it is taking place in the MCU, how can Ejiofor be playing a soldier when he was previously cast as Baron Mordo in 2016’s Doctor Strange? Adding to that confusion even further is the fact that Rhys Ifans appears to be playing a new character, rather than reprising his role as Dr. Curt Connors.
The simplest explanation for this scene is that it isn’t taking place in the MCU, but in Sony’s universe. We’re probably seeing the SMU version of the bar, one that just happens to have the same bartender as the MCU version. In this scenario, Ejiofor is likely playing a new character in a universe that has no Baron Mordo. The same goes for Ifans. It’s no different than the fact that, in the DC multiverse, Legends of Tomorrow’s Ray Palmer and Superman Returns’ Kal-El both look like Brandon Routh.
But that still leaves the question of why the symbiote fragment is suddenly in the SMU rather than the MCU. There are two possibilities here. One is that Sony is retconning the ending to No Way Home so that the fragment was left behind in the SMU instead. Perhaps Marvel got cold feet about the idea of tying together Hardy’s Venom and Holland’s Spider-Man in such a tangible way. The other possibility is that the symbiote left behind more than one piece of itself. Even as Ejiofor’s character captures one fragment in his universe, another fragment may still linger in the MCU, waiting for the day it encounters Peter Parker.
Whatever is going on here, it doesn’t change the fact that the SMU and MCU have been established as parallel universes within the same multiverse. Holland’s Spider-Man doesn’t exist in the SMU, but that doesn’t mean these characters couldn’t cross paths down the road. It all depends on how closely Marvel and Sony agree to work together in the future, and what shape Sony’s Spider-Man Universe takes after Venom: The Last Dance and Kraven the Hunter hit theaters later this year.
For more on Venom: The Last Dance, find out why the time has come to explore the coolest part of the symbiote's backstory, and brush up on every Spider-Man movie in development.
Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.
