Many Spider-Man villains have shined in their on-screen adaptations, but one of Spidey’s foes has been wasted twice by Sony in 15 years.
Sony has a large catalog of Spider-Man villains they can use, but the studio hasn’t done justice to one villain who it has wasted twice. Spider-Man’s foes are some of the best in Marvel’s history, both in the comics and in the franchise’s on-screen history. Willem Dafoe’s Green Goblin stole the show in Spider-Man and Spider-Man: No Way Home, and Alfred Molina’s Doctor Octopus proved to be a complex, tragic villain in Spider-Man 2. The MCU timeline has also done right by Spider-Man’s enemies, with Michael Keaton’s Vulture and Jake Gyllenhaals’ Mysterio being excellent rivals to Tom Holland’s Peter Parker.
However, a few Spider-Man movie villains have been botched by Sony. Venom landed with mixed results in Spider-Man 3, and Morbius failed to garner any interest from audiences. There are still some villains that Sony has yet to use, including Kraven the Hunter, who is getting his own film in late 2024. Other villains had been used before but were wasted by Sony, including one villain whom Sony failed to use successfully twice.
Black Cat Was Meant To Be In Spider-Man 4 and The Amazing Spider-Man Series
Felicia Hardy a.k.a Black Cat is an expert cat burglar, who is also trained in various fighting styles and acrobatics. Similar to DC’s Catwoman, Felicia is sometimes portrayed as a villain but is usually an anti-hero, and has an off-and-on romantic relationship with Spider-Man. Black Cat is a character Sony has been trying to get on-screen for a while, but it hasn’t worked out how the studio wanted. The character was supposed to play a role in Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 4 with Anne Hathaway already cast in the role.
Sony announced the fourth film in 2009, but it was canceled, and Hathaway never got the chance to bring Felicia to the big screen. However, she did get the chance to play DC’s Black Cat counterpart, portraying Selina Kyle in The Dark Knight Rises. In 2014, Felicia appeared in a small role in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, portrayed by Felicity Jones. She was one of Harry Osborn’s sidekicks, but this second on-screen version of the character never donned the Black Cat outfit – and never had the chance to after the sequel, since a third film was never made.
Why Black Cat Would Fit The MCU Better Than Sony’s Spider-Man Universe
Black Cat’s dynamic with Spider-Man is one of the most engaging aspects of her character, and demonstrates Felicia’s moral and emotional complexities well. With this in mind, while she could work in the Sony universe, she’d be missing some of her best stories until the universe brings the hero into the fold. As such, in the MCU, she would be an excellent character for Holland’s Spider-Man to interact with as he explored being more of a lone hero, now that MJ and everyone else doesn’t know who Peter Parker is.
