Morbius Director Addresses That Post-Credits Team-Up Tease
After being delayed somewhat from its release date of July, 2020, the living vampire movie "Morbius," starring Jared Leto as the titular living vampire, has finally been set loose in theaters. You've probably heard about it, and it might not be nice things that you've heard. At the time of this writing, the film is at 17 percent with critics and 67 percent with audiences on Rotten Tomatoes. How much credence you give to critics and other viewers is up to you, and there is a reason you clicking on this article. Maybe it's because you actually liked the film, or maybe you just want to know how this connects to the larger Sony Spider-Verse, or the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
I'm going to assume that you've seen the film. I have yet to view it, though I do know what happens in the two post-credits scenes. Occupational hazard, and one I can hardly complain about. That is all to say that there are SPOILERS ahead. If you, like me, don't mind spoilers — great! If you do, turn back now. This will be your only warning.
Here's what happens
In the first post-credits scene, a purple portal has appeared over New York City. This is, of course, the multiverse breaking open from the spell that Doctor Strange casts to make sure no one remembers who Peter Parker is in "Spider-Man: No Way Home." Adrian Toomes (the Vulture, played by Michael Keaton, who was the main antagonist of "Spider-Man: Homecoming"), then suddenly appears in a jail in New York, having slipped through a crack in the multiverse and into Morbius' world during the turbulence of the spell. Interestingly, Vulture still knows who Peter Parker is, something that the spell was designed to make people forget. I am no wizard though, so who am I to say how spells work?
Toomes says something like, "Hope the food here's better than the other joint." I mean, sure Food is probably not the first thing I would think about after being transported into another universe, but perhaps that's just me. We hear on a television broadcast that Toomes will be released from prison since, of course, no one here knows who he is or what he did.
In the second scene, Morbius is driving in the desert where he meets up with Toomes, who is wearing a brand new Vulture suit. Apparently Toomes thinks Spider-Man is responsible ... which he kind of is, but I have no idea how Toomes would know that, or if he's just venting his rage at the kid who put him in jail. Toomes then suggests to Morbius and a few other guys team up to "do some good" — those other guys potentially including Kraven the Hunter, who is set to be played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson in another upcoming Marvel movie — which, like "Venom" and "Morbius," will be under the purview of Sony's Spider-Man Universe, rather than being a Marvel Studios MCU movie.
So, are we heading for the Sinister Six?
"Morbius" director Daniel Espinosa was interviewed by Variety, and spoke about the team-up teased in the post-credits scene. Asked if Morbius and Vulture would be the brains of the operation, Espinosa said:
"I think they're pretty brainy, both of them. Vulture is pure mechanic ingenuity. Morbius is regarded as one of the five big geniuses of the Marvel Universe. As a biologist, there are very few other people that have the same strength, maybe Hank McCoy as Dark Beast. Wasn't it a Spider-Man comic where Aunt May was sick? And he gathers Reed Richards, Tony Stark, all the geniuses, and in there is Michael Morbius."
Cool. Cool Cool Cool. Espinosa was then asked which other characters Morbius and Vulture should team up with. He said:
"I think Norman Osborn would be very interesting. That's a whole different idea, that's like if you go away from the idea of Sinister Six and you're going into something different. There are other possibilities, because it's been made for so many years. For me, what Kevin Feige made so brilliant was the way they took many of the mythologies and chose different parts of them and the realization that it doesn't have to start just like the comics started. You don't have to go from the '60s and the '70s and then to the '80s and '90s. You can take from the 2000s, which was like 'Civil War,' and mix them with other concepts of characters that are from earlier parts of the comic book universe."
So, which version of Norman Osborn? There could be a whole bunch of them around the universes. That's the thing about the multiverse: You can pretty much do anything you want with no plot hole issues, "because multiverse." I love the idea of not being tied to the comics of any particular time. I'll watch Michael Keaton do anything. That said, I guess this means I have to go see "Morbius."