Spider-Man: Far From Home will introduce Jake Gyllenhaal’s Mysterio into the MCU, a character who’s already caught the imaginations of Marvel fans thanks to the intriguing footage we’ve got of him so far in the trailers. Is he a good guy? Is he from another world? Why does he have a fishbowl on his head?
Another good question is why was the Master of Illusion picked to be the main villain of the sequel, following on from Michael Keaton’s Vulture in Spider-Man: Homecoming? Well, director Jon Watts revealed the answer to the assembled press at a FFH set visit.
First of all, he pointed to the original appearance of Mysterio – The Amazing Spider-Man Vol. 1 #13 – as a huge source of inspiration in the movie’s depiction of Quentin Beck. The storyline, which sees Mysterio framing Spidey and passing himself off as a good guy, made the villain an “exciting choice” for Watts.
“Mysterio enters the comic as a hero. So, I always took it right back to the source material and what made that character exciting initially. But in terms of how we ended up with Mysterio in the first place, I mean, I wanted to put a character on screen that we hadn’t seen before.”
Having decided to go for an antagonist not yet seen on the big screen, Mysterio was Watts’ top pick as his aptitude for special effects and the, well, mystery surrounding his abilities gave FFH a lot of possibilities to explore.
“Of the big, iconic villains, Mysterio was the one who jumped to the top. Because of who he is, what he may-or-may-not be able to do, it’s really opened up a lot of possibilities for the kind of story we can tell with him.”
Those who are familiar with the character are prepared for Beck to be lying about a lot of things in the movie. However, there’s currently a debate over how much he’s fibbing about. Is the tease of a Marvel multiverse in the recent second trailer a ruse, or does Mysterio really come from Earth-833 – it’s just that he’s a bad guy there, not a hero?
Time will tell, but the character will finally be demystified when Spider-Man: Far From Home swings into cinemas on July 2nd.