Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse Almost Had ‘Huge’ Live Action Sequences

Warning: This article features spoilers for elements of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, despite being a follow-up to one of the most beloved animated films in recent memory, almost included “huge live action sequences”.

While the film had glimpses into the MCU with clips from earlier Spider-Man movies, it sounds like fans might’ve gotten a look at some other live action Spideys.

During an interview with Variety, Across the Spider-Verse directors Kemp Powers and Justin K. Thompson revealed they originally planned to go beyond those live-action clips.

“There were times when we had huge live-action sequences in the film, and it just turned into a bad joke.”

“We had even bigger ambitions,” said Thompson.

“There were times when we had huge live-action sequences in the film, and it just turned into a bad joke,” added Powers. “Even we didn’t like it anymore. And we just said, ‘OK, enough, let’s make sure that it’s something precise that gets the most bang for the buck, and speaks to the story.’”

Neither Thompson nor Powers would reveal what those sequences were about, but it sounds like they were canned fairly early into the process, only existing as storyboards and animatics with cut-out versions of the characters dubbed by crew members.

“They had the look of like a South Park character,” said Powers.

“We should do that as a character,” added Thompson

Across the Spider-Verse has already made quite an impression on audiences across the globe, earning a massive $208.6 million during its global debut. In fact, its domestic opening was almost triple that of the original Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.

Now revealed to be part of a three-part trilogy, Across the Spider-Verse poses some interesting questions about what’s to come.

IGN’s review of Across the Spider-Verse gave it 8/10 and said: Surging with vibrant visuals and relentlessly chaotic action, Across the Spider-Verse is a worthy follow-up to an all-time classic.”

Want to read more about Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse? Check out our rankings of all the Spider-Man films as well as our breakdown of all the different Spider-Men we spotted in the movie.

Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.