Jon Watts Says Reddit Changed the Way Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire Were Introduced in ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’

It’s hard to imagine now, but back when Spider-Man: No Way Home was still being made, one of Marvel’s biggest secrets was that Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield were coming back.

Fans had been talking about it nonstop online, and by the time the movie hit theaters, most people had a strong feeling it was happening, even though Marvel kept both of them completely out of all the trailers and posters.

Now, director Jon Watts is explaining how one Reddit post actually changed the way those two Spider-Men were introduced in the movie.

Watts recently spoke at the Mediterrane Film Festival during a panel hosted by Collider’s Steve Weintraub. When asked how the team kept things so secret, Watts said that the pandemic actually helped. “It was in the middle of the pandemic. So it was actually much easier to keep things a secret because we couldn’t really leave the stage… The world was so isolated,” he said.

But even with that isolation, leaks were still a concern. And Reddit, as it turns out, played a bigger role than expected.

Watts explained that while they were still figuring out how to reveal Tobey and Andrew’s Spider-Men in the film, he came across some fan art on Reddit. The image showed a sad Peter Parker on a rooftop, with Doctor Strange-style portals opening behind him, and out stepped the two other Spider-Men. It was exactly the kind of dramatic reveal you’d expect. The problem? It was too expected.

“I was on Reddit, and I was looking at people who had already made fan art of, ‘This is probably what it’s going to be like,’” he said. “I was like, ‘Well, we can’t do that. If that’s exactly what everyone thinks we’re going to do, we absolutely can’t do that.’”

So Watts decided to do the complete opposite. Instead of a big rooftop scene, he had the two Spider-Men show up in a very casual, low-key moment, at Ned’s grandma’s house, of all places.

“What does no one expect that we’re going to do? What’s something that no one’s going to see coming?” he recalled thinking. “Probably having the two Spider-Men appear at Ned’s Filipino grandma’s house in Queens.”

It was a choice that totally surprised audiences and felt funny, warm, and personal. Watts said it also made sense in the story because it was the first time we left Peter’s perspective and focused on Ned and MJ trying to figure things out on their own.

He also shared a funny behind-the-scenes detail: the actress who played Ned’s grandma wasn’t even an actor. “It was the middle of the pandemic, so we had to find a lady and fly her from Hawaii to Atlanta,” he explained.

That Reddit moment wasn’t just a fun story, it actually made the movie better. Watts said it reminded him of a quote from old silent film star Buster Keaton: “I like the audience to think that they’ve outguessed me, and then I double-cross them.”

Spider-Man: No Way Home ended up being one of the biggest Marvel movies ever, making $1.9 billion at the box office. While the return of Tobey and Andrew was a massive crowd-pleaser, it’s stories like this that show how much thought went into making their appearance more than just fan service. And yes—Reddit helped, even if by accident.

Watts made it clear they didn’t want Tobey and Andrew to just show up, wave, and leave. “I absolutely refuse to make that,” he said. Instead, the goal was to have the three Spider-Men learn from each other and be part of something emotional and meaningful.

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