When Marvel Studios and Sony brought Jon Watts on board to direct 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecomingthe director was a relative unknown in the industry. Watts had only directed one film–2015’s Cop Car–before being given the great responsibility of weaving a web of Spidey stories into an MCU-set trilogy. What followed was one of the shared universe’s most financially and critically successful trilogies which wrapped up in 2021 with Spider-Man: No Way Home, the third-highest-grossing film in Marvel Studios’ very illustrious history.
Given his success behind the camera for the Spider-Man trilogy, Marvel Studios turned to Watts to shepherd another incredibly important franchise into the MCU in the Fantastic Four. However, as delays on the project piled up and other projects took precedence for Wattshe amicably left the project. Still, it seemed all but a sure thing that he’d return to the MCU, especially with a second Spidey trilogy in the works but earlier this year, Watts made it clear that he was not going back behind the camera for Spider-Man 4. With his new film, Wolfrecently debuting, Watts has been making the rounds and in an interview with THR, explained why he chose to pass on the new Spidey project and instead direct Wolf which he created from an original idea.
“I was just getting started and Marvel came along — and I take full creative ownership over all those films — but Spider-Man is always going to be Stan Lee and Steve Ditko‘s creation,” said Watts of jumping into the MCU, adding, “This was the chance for me to go back to my voice and my vision and my style. Wolf is mine, and that’s a really good feeling.”
Ironically enough, it was another “really good feeling” that inspired Watts to walk away from the MCU. Recalling the Los Angeles premiere of Spider-Man: No Way Homethe director explained that he came to the realization that he could never duplicate the special feelings the film–which was one of the first major post-pandemic releases–provided the audience.”That was such a specific moment in time, and the reaction to that movie was just so unbelievable,” said Watts. “It’s never going to be like this, ever again.” And so, rather than chase something unattainable, Watts chose to walk away on top.
With Wolf, Watts has had near total control of the project from beginning to end, something that’s just not part of the Marvel machine’s way of doing business. “Sometimes you do an action movie, and all the fun action stuff is given to the second-unit director,” explained Watts. “On the Marvel movies, you split up the work because there’s so much to be done. Rarely do you get the Christopher Nolan opportunity to do all of it. On this one, I was like, ‘I want to shoot every single shot.’“
Whether or not Watts finds his way back to the MCU someday remains to be seen; however, it certainly sounds more likely that he’s enjoying the freedom to create from scratch and may continue to explore similar avenues in the future. Watts’ next project, Lucasfilm’s Star Wars: Skeleton Crewwhich was filmed in 2022, debuts on Disney Plus on December 3rd.
Source: THR
