Before Tom Cruise became the quintessence of action movies, extolled for driving motorcycles off clifftops and climbing skyscrapers, there was a time when he could’ve made a name for shooting spiderwebs, which he almost did back in the ’80s.
Hardcore Spidey fans know just how close the Top Gun: Maverick star had come to portraying perhaps one of the most doted-on superheroes of all time. To commemorate the same, Sony even planned on surprising the audience with a cameo of Cruise accompanied by James Cameron in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. But alas, it never saw the light of day.
Why Tom Cruise’s Nixed Spider-Man Never Made it
When Cannon Films was in the works to adapt the Spider-Man comics into a silver screen outing, they had their minds set on Tom Cruise, who’d then been freshly soaked in the success of Risky Business (1983), to depict the web-slinger in the movie. At a later stage in the mid ’90s, when James Cameron was attached to the project, he had originally planned on developing a movie version of Spider-Man. But of course, that was before Sam Raimi took over the director’s chair and Tobey Maguire starred as Peter Parker in the 2002 venture.
In light of the same, what filmmakers Rodney Rothman, Bob Persichetti, and Pete Ramsey had in mind, was to feature a Cameron and Cruise cameo in the form of an audio commentary. So, rather than Miles schooling himself about the ins and outs of being Spider-Man from an old comic book, he’d come to learn about it all through the audio narration.
And while it would’ve made for a perfect trip down memory lane, just the right amount of nostalgia infused with fun, the directors realized it was too convoluted an idea for the general audience to decode. “And the fact that it’s taken us almost three minutes to explain this idea to you, it gives you an idea of why it didn’t make it in,” Rothman remarked in their interview with Slash Film about why they had to axe that scene from Into the Spider-Verse.
Related: James Cameron Needs To Direct His Unfinished Spider-Man Movie Because Sony Needs a Win After Morbius
A Little Backstory Into How It Boiled Down to Sam Raimi’s Spidey
What the Avatar director envisioned all those years ago, was bound to leave the audience polarized because the 68-year-old wanted to bring a Peter Parker with a penchant for salacity and profanit on the big screens. And well, the studio wasn’t exactly willing to gamble with an R-Rated Spider-Man back in the ’90s, which is why it never materialized. However, David Koepp, who was in charge of the screenplay of Raimi’s film, did utilize certain elements from Cameron’s script.
As for Cruise’s scrapped webhead, the Mission: Impossible star had once been inches away from derailing Maguire’s career in the franchise considering just how close he’d come to depicting the titular character. But in a way, it was for the best because that role was practically meant for the latter.
Spider-Man is currently streaming on both Netflix and Disney+. Meanwhile, you can rent/purchase Into the Spider-Verse on Apple Tv+.
Source: Slash Film
