Though it hasn't even been two years since The Amazing Spider-Man 2 released, that film and its Spider-Man, Andrew Garfield, already feel like ancient history. That's how quickly things are moving in the Spider-Man movie-verse. The largely unenthusiastic response to Amazing Spider-Man 2 led to Sony and Marvel brokering a deal, with plans to re-cast and re-introduce the character within the MCU.

Fast-forward ten months and here we are: Tom Holland is the new Spider-Man and he'll make his first appearance in Captain America: Civil War in 2016, before headlining his own film for 2017. It's all happened so quickly and no one is more aware of that than Holland himself. The young actor has been acting for much of his short life, but has never taken on any role that can even compare to magnitude of Spider-Man.

Currently, Holland is making the press rounds for In The Heart of the Sea, but invariably he's asked about Spider-Man more than anything else. Talking with The Daily Beast and not being allowed to share any solid details about his role, Holland shared his casting experience, which began when he called his agent, wanting to send in a tape to Marvel, only to learn Marvel was already requesting a self tape! "That alone was crazy," says Holland. "I couldn’t quite believe that Marvel knew who I was."

From there, Holland filmed a self-tape, submitted it, received notes from Marvel's casting director Sarah Finn, re-taped and resubmitted to Marvel. Afterwards, Holland was asked to film another self-tape, admitting, "I ended up doing five self-tapes in total." After the fifth and final self-tape, Holland came to Finn's office for a reading, which impressed her enough that he then scored the coveted screen test:

"I did two—one with RDJ, Robert Downey Jr., who was amazing. I couldn’t have asked for a cooler guy. And the second test was with Chris Evans, and it was pretty awesome and kind of surreal for me. We had to do a movement test and then I said, ‘Can I just demonstrate some of the things that I can do?’ and they all were a little unsure of what I was talking about, and then I did a series of backflips and landed on the X, and was like, ‘Thank you!’ and then just left."

That's certainly one way to leave an impression! And as it turns out, those backflips did the trick. Holland was cast as the MCU's Spider-Man, but rather than learning the news from his agent or a call from Marvel, Holland learned just we did - via the internet:

"I was having this terrible day and I went home and was scrolling through Instagram, and I saw Marvel had posted a photo of Spider-Man with the message, ‘We have cast the new Spider-Man! Go to our website to see who it is. I learned about it online with everybody else, and I just went bananas."

After collecting himself, Holland called his agents to confirm like a sensible young man, which of course they did. He then received a call from Marvel Studios head honcho, Kevin Feige, and the rest as they say is history. Or in this case the future. This coming May to be specific, when Holland debuts as Peter Parker - a young, high school kid, but one who's already operating as the web-slinger, earning himself the name: Spider-Man.

NEXT: Spider-Man's Civil War Role & Costume Details

Captain America: Civil War will release on May 6, 2016, followed by Doctor Strange– November 4, 2016; Guardians of the Galaxy 2 – May 5, 2017; Spider-Man – July 28, 2017; Thor: Ragnarok – November 3, 2017; Black Panther – February 16, 2018; The Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 – May 4, 2018; Ant-Man and the Wasp – July 6, 2018;Captain Marvel – March 8, 2019; The Avengers: Infinity War Part 2 – May 3, 2019;Inhumans – July 12, 2019; and as-yet untitled Marvel movies on May 1, July 10 and November 6, 2020.

Source: The Daily Beast