The latest trailer for Spider-Man: Far From Home came with a warning from Tom Holland attached to it. He told anyone who hadn’t seen Avengers: Endgame yet to refrain from watching the trailer, due to spoilers. It was an apt warning, too since the trailer was rammed with them.
The most interesting revelation for long-time MCU fans was the fact that the various finger-snaps in Endgame tore a hole in reality and opened a portal to multiple alternate universes. Naturally, dozens of fan theories about the MCU’s multiverse have followed. Here are some of the best.
Mysterio is lying and there is no multiverse
All we know about the multiverse in the MCU so far is that Jake Gyllenhaal’s Mysterio claims to have traveled through it, along with the Elementals. But since Mysterio is one of the trickiest, slipperiest villains in Marvel canon, some fans are taking his declaration with a pinch of salt.
There’s one fan theory that he’s lying. In the comics, he’s a member of the Sinister Six, the supervillain team dedicated to destroying Spider-Man. He claims to be from a world where Spider-Man doesn’t exist, which is a paradise in the Sinister Six’s eyes. Maybe we can’t really trust this guy.
Nick Fury is the Chameleon in disguise
The plot of Spider-Man: Far From Home seems vaguely odd from the trailers. Mysterio, one of Spider-Man’s most infamous enemies from the comics, is positioned as his sidekick. Nick Fury has taken the multiverse case to Spider-Man, as opposed to a more qualified Avenger like Doctor Strange. It all seems highly unlikely.
So, some fans have theorized that the Nick Fury of the trailers is actually the Chameleon in disguise, and he’s working with Mysterio (and possibly the rest of the Sinister Six) to trick Spider-Man and lead him into some kind of elaborate trap. This theory seems like it could have some merit.
The X-Men are in an alternate universe
Marvel Studios has finally gotten the rights to the X-Men and the Fantastic Four, thanks to a landmark deal between Fox and Disney. However, it’ll be a little tricky to introduce them into the MCU. For example, Wolverine is supposed to be ageless. He was born over a century ago. So, if he exists in the MCU, why has been hiding from the action all these years?
The MCU would struggle to explain that, and that’s where the multiverse comes in. An alternative universe would be the perfect way to explain the existence of the X-Men in the MCU, and help to keep its fictional world from becoming too crowded.
The Fantastic Four are in an alternate universe
This is basically the same theory as the X-Men one, but the Fantastic Four are different. They’re the older, wiser characters. They were the first superheroes introduced into the Marvel universe, and so they were older and more experienced than the other heroes in every crossover that followed.
Remember how awful the 2015 reboot turned out when it tried to make them hip and young? For them to fit into the MCU, they’d have to have been around for a while. But for that to work, they’ll need to have existed in an alternate timeline. The multiverse seems to fix that.
Loki went to one of the parallel universes
In Avengers: Endgame, when the Hulk bumped a time-traveling Tony Stark and he dropped the Space Stone right in front of a handcuffed Loki, the Norse trickster god saw an opportunity to escape. He grabbed the Space Stone and disappeared into an otherworldly portal with it.
However, we never heard from him again, so it’s unclear where, or when, he went with it – or if Captain America was even able to track him down and retrieve the Space Stone when he went back in time at the end of Endgame. Then, the focus was more on how he got super old than whether or not his mission succeeded. Now that we know there’s a multiverse, Loki could’ve gone to one of those parallel universes.
S.H.I.E.L.D. has branched off into S.W.O.R.D. and A.R.M.O.R.
S.H.I.E.L.D.’s role in the MCU has been a little vague ever since Captain America: The Winter Soldier revealed it to have secretly been Hydra since World War II, as everyone in the organization except for Cap, Black Widow, Nick Fury, Phil Coulson, and Maria Hill knew.
In the comics, when the multiverse was introduced, S.H.I.E.L.D. branched off into two new organizations named S.W.O.R.D. and A.R.M.O.R. S.W.O.R.D. (Sentient World Observation and Response Department) is based on a space station and defends Earth from aliens, while A.R.M.O.R. (Altered Reality Monitoring and Operational Response) protects Earth from interdimensional threats. Maybe this explains Nick Fury’s role in Spider-Man: Far From Home – and in the future of the MCU.
The movie is set across two different timelines
According to director Jon Watts, answering the lingering questions left behind after the global chaos in Avengers: Endgame is the top priority with Spider-Man: Far From Home, but it will also see Peter Parker deal with alternate timelines:
“We had to look at it in terms of the scope of what happened at the end of Endgame, seeing all the crazy things that they did and all the questions that raises. So, we’re definitely trying to answer one of the big ones: alternate timelines. So many possibilities opened up at the end of Endgame and Peter Parker is one of the few people on the ground dealing with them.” Maybe the movie is set across two different timelines, Sliding Doors-style.
Peter Parker will disappear into an alternate universe at the end
The MCU’s multiverse will be better for business than storytelling, really. It gives Disney a lucrative chance to integrate the Marvel characters they’ve acquired from Fox into the MCU, while Sony’s mini Marvel-verse that includes Tom Hardy’s Venom and Jared Leto’s Morbius the Living Vampire will have a chance to rope in Tom Holland’s Spider-Man.
Marvel Studio’s agreement with Sony that allowed them to borrow Spider-Man only allowed them to make five movies with him. Far From Home is the fifth movie, and there’s no word yet on where that deal stands. So, it’s possible that Peter Parker will disappear into an alternate universe that contains Venom and Morbius at the end of Far From Home.
The Spidey in the black suit is from another reality
In the Spider-Man: Far From Home trailer – not just the new, spoilery, post-Endgame one; the earlier one, too – we see Spidey swinging around in a black suit that resembles the Spider-Man Noir suit from the comics. This new black suit is being officially described as a “Stealth Suit,” but there’s nothing in the trailer connecting our universe’s Spider-Man to the one in the black suit.
There’s no clip where Nick Fury gives him the suit or he puts it together himself. Some fans think the trailer is hiding the fact that the Spidey in the black suit is from another reality in the multiverse.
Mysterio is his universe’s Spider-Man
In the Spider-Man: Far From Home trailer, Quentin Beck (a.k.a. Mysterio) claims to be from a different version of Earth where there is no Spider-Man. Some fans have theorized that Beck is actually the Spider-Man of his timeline.
Famously, during the production of Spider-Man 2 when Tobey Maguire sustained an injury and it was unclear if he’d be able to finish the movie, Sony cast Jake Gyllenhaal to replace him. In the end, Maguire was able to finish the movie. If this fan theory turns out to be true, then it’ll be a nice way for Gyllenhaal to play Spidey after all.
