Rumor or Fact: Who’s appearing in Spider-Man: No Way Home?

Tobey Maguire! Andrew Garfield! Venom! Doc Ock! There are lots of rumors about who’s returning for Spider-Man: No Way Home. But which are true? We break it down.

Ever since Alfred Molina described his appearance in the upcoming Spider-Man: No Way Home as “the worst kept secret in Hollywood,” fans have been ravenous for more information about this movie. Due to release on December 17, the third installment of the MCU Spidey franchise is shaping up to be a once-in-a-lifetime cinema event. Spider-Man is unique among the Marvel heroes in that the rights to make movies about him are co-owned by Marvel and Sony, the latter of which made all of the Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield era Spidey-films. When the two companies reached an accord that allowed the MCU to introduce its own version of Spider-Man — a teenaged iteration of the friendly neighborhood webslinger played by Tom Holland — fans around the world rejoiced.

Things have gotten more complicated since then, with Sony and Marvel going through more rounds of negotiations. Joint custody of a superhero, it turns out, isn’t easy. Thankfully, the waters appear to have calmed…and even more excitingly, all signs indicate that Sony and Marvel are now working together even more closely to make a whole universe of Spidey-centric movies a reality. Take this quote from MCU boss Kevin Feige:

"[Spider-Man] also happens to be the only hero with the superpower to cross cinematic universes, so as Sony continues to develop their own Spidey-verse you never know what surprises the future might hold."

With Spider-Man: No Way Home, it’s been pretty much confirmed that the two companies are combining their creative power to do a live-action take on a “Spiderverse” movie, with characters from the previous two eras of Sony films colliding with Tom Holland’s MCU Spider-Man in a huge, Multiverse-style bash. We know this is happening because of a few confirmed actors who will be in the film; we’ve also heard that it will utilize the same visual effects teams from both the Maguire and Garfield era movies. And the Loki finale that aired this past week laid the groundwork for a new Multiversal War, perfectly setting the stage for things to get weird in Spider-Man: No Way Home. All of this suggests a movie that’s going to be like nothing we’ve ever seen before.

Of course, for every confirmed piece of information about Spidey’s Multiverse epic, there are also a ton of unsubstantiated rumors. This is the internet, after all. It can be hard to figure out what we actually know about No Way Home from what we only think we know.

So we’re going to dissect all the rumors we can find to separate the fact from the fiction. It’s Spider-Man: Rumor or Fact?

Tobey Maguire is in Spider-Man: No Way Home — Rumor…with a wink

Perhaps the actor people are speculating about the most is Tobey Maguire. Maguire played Peter Parker / Spider-Man in three movies for Sony: Spider-Man (2002), Spider-Man 2 (2004), and the much maligned Spider-Man 3 (2007). Regardless of how well those films have aged, they still stand as some of the first movies to really usher in this new era of superhero films. So when the idea of a Multiverse-style adventure for Spider-Man hit the rumor mill, people started talking about Maguire reprising his role as an older Peter Parker.

However, to date this is a rumor…with a catch: the infamous “wink.” Apparently, a fan ran into Tobey Maguire at a park recently, and the two got to talking about Spider-Man. This fan claimed Maguire “[is] gonna be in the new movie. I know that for a fact…he’s gonna do another movie and then that’s it.” When asked for more details, the fan claimed that when he asked Maguire about his involvement in Spider-Man: No Way Home, Maguire “winked at me and smiled.”

It’s far from concrete evidence, but it’s more than enough to keep the mill turning.

The thing I find most intriguing about this rumor is Maguire’s very conspicuous silence on the matter. He obviously knows about all these fan theories, and has thus far made absolutely no public statements about it. Unlike our next Spidey…