In a surprising reveal today, Marvel Studios and Sony Pictures have selected director Destin Daniel Cretton to helm “Spider-Man 4,” the fourth installment of their Tom Holland-led string of MCU-set Spidey movies. This comes after Destin had previously made “Shang-Chi & The Legend of The Ten Rings” and is still actively involved with its untitled sequel. An exciting update on the superhero pic that comes to us from The Hollywood Reporter and is backed up by other outlets like Deadline, ending over a year of speculation and rumors of who would take the reigns from Jon Watts.

Screenwriters Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers are returning with an expectation that filming could begin as early next year. We shouldn’t be terribly shocked if Destin adds his own contributions to the script like he did with “Shang-Chi.”

Cretton had previously returned to the MCU with the upcoming Disney+ series “Wonder Man.”

No official plot details have yet to be revealed for “Spider-Man 4,” but Marvel is in a very good position to do an event-level crossover with Charlie Cox‘s Matt Murdock (who briefly appeared in “Spider-Man: No Way Home” as a lawyer working on behalf of Peter Parker) as the series revival “Daredevil: Born Again” has Daredevil, Punisher, and The Kingpin inhabiting the same MCU space as Parker in New York City. Perhaps, allowing the studio to bring the Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man back to his roots as a crime-fighter and tackling crooks like The Hand (aligned with Wilson Fisk) and the New York City mafia by way of The Maggia (Hammerhead, Tombstone, and other mobsters could finally get their big-screen live-action debuts).

A potential mob war plot wouldn’t be exactly a stretch or challenge for Destin, as he previously tackled The Ten Rings in “Shang-Chi,” a criminal syndicate led by Shang-Chi’s father, Wenwu, and is now being overseen by his sister.

Other street-level heroes operating in the same city include Luke Cage/Power Man, Danny Rand/Iron Fist, and Jessica Jones.

The filmmaker had been once attached to make “Avengers: The Kang Dynasty” before the project was re-tooled into “Avengers: Doomsday” with Robert Downey Jr. set to star as a version of Victor von Doom and landed the Russo Brothers as Cretton’s replacements.

A release date hasn’t been mentioned, but there is a good shot that “Spider-Man 4” could be ready for the summer of 2026 if production starts up in the new year.

SOURCE: THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER