Comic-books fans have been spoiled this week thanks to the release of new trailers, and one of them, the second trailer for Sony’s Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, has prompted Marvel fans to believe that Kraven the Hunter star, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, will be in the animated movie in some capacity.
An extraordinary amount of new characters returned in the recent trailer, including Jessica Drew (a.k.a. Spider-Woman), Spider-Punk, Spider-Man India, Bombastic Bag Man, The Amazing Spider Monkey, Lady Spider, Scarlet Spider, and many more.
Directed by Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, and Justin K. Thompson with a screenplay by Phil Lord, Christopher Miller, and David Callaham, Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse is a direct sequel to 2018’s Into the Spider-Verse from Sony and sees the return of Shameik Moore as protagonist Miles Morales in a labyrinth of alternate universes known as the Spider-Verse.
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Marvel fans believe Aaron Taylor-Johnson is in Across the Spider-Verse
Soon after the Across the Spider-Verse trailer dropped yesterday, April 4, 2023, followers of the Bullet Train star, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, noticed that the actor had posted the trailer on his Instagram account.
Taylor-Johnson accompanied the post with the caption “New trailer drop, In theatres June 2.” with the hashtag “#SpiderVerse.”
What’s curious about this is actors don’t usually share trailers on their personal accounts unless they are in the movie, doing their share of the marketing and Taylor-Johnson was clearly promoting the movie in this post.
This quickly lead fans to ask the actor if he was in the movie, but of course, the actor did not respond in the comments section.
Taylor-Johnson’s post has received over 31,000 likes on the social media platform and the actor has limited comments on the post.
The fandom began debating who he could be playing, with some saying the antagonist, The Spot, sounded like the actor.
Taylor-Johnson is not voicing The Spot, however, as that role is already confirmed to be played by American actor and musician Jason Schwartzman.
Since Taylor-Johnson has already played Marvel character Pietro Maximoff, a.k.a. Quicksilver, in the MCU, and now in line to play Sergei Kravinoff, a.k.a. Kraven the Hunter, in the Sony universe, that doesn’t leave many options.
Pietro was killed back in Avengers: Age of Ultron, and even though anything is possible within the multiverse these days, it’s highly unlikely that the character will return in Across the Spider-Verse.
One character that does have a connection to Spider-Man from the comics is Kraven the Hunter – a classic nemesis of Peter Parker’s – so there’s a chance Taylor-Johnson could debut as the Hunter in animated form first.
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Meet the Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse Cast
Shameik Moore and Hailee Steinfeld will be returning to lead roles, Miles and Gwen, alongside Oscar Isaac’s return as Spider-Man 2099.
The original voice actor for the Japanese Spider-Man, Takuya Yamashiro, is rumored to be involved, alongside VA Yuri Lowenthal who may be reprising his role as Spidey from Insomniac Games’ PlayStation game.
Below, we have included the cast list we know so far for Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse:
- Shameik Moore – Miles Morales / Spider-Man
- Hailee Steinfeld – Gwen Stacy / Spider-Woman
- Jake Johnson – Peter B. Parker / Spider-Man
- Oscar Isaac – Miguel O’Hara / Spider-Man 2099
- Issa Rae – Jessica Drew / Spider-Woman
- Daniel Kaluuya – Hobart “Hobie” Brown / Spider-Punk
- Jason Schwartzman – The Spot
- Brian Tyree Henry – Jefferson Davis
- Luna Lauren Vélez – Rio Morales
- Greta Lee – Lyla
- Rachel Dratch – Counselor
- Jorma Taccone – the Vulture
- Shea Whigham – George Stacy

By Jo Craig – [email protected]
Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse releases in theatres on June 2, 2023.