Thomas Haden Church, who plays the Sandman, hinted at a potential big-screen appearance for his Marvel character.
In the Tom Holland-led Spider-Man: No Way Home, Church, who made his Marvel debut in the 2007 film Spider-Man 3 by competing against Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man/Peter Parker, recently made a comeback in the world of superheroes.
In the MCU Spider-Man 3 sequel, the actor only made an appearance as a CG figure, engaging the three Spider-Men in an iconic battle atop the Statue of Liberty (which actually reused footage from another wall-crawling blockbuster).
Church did not get the completely costumed comeback he may have wanted because he was never truly on the No Way Home set. Even if his character was given another chance to shine on the big screen, this was still true.
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Marvel’s Sandman Has a Future Teased
Thomas Haden Church, who starred in Spider-Man 3 and Spider-Man: No Way Home, suggested that his time as Marvel’s Sandman might not be over an interview with Pilot Productions.
Church acknowledged that he, No Way Home director Jon Watts, Sony producer and executive Amy Pascal, and Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige were all interested in reprising their respective superhuman roles “all engaged in numerous discussions, some of which focused on the prospect of Sandman returning:
“We all had a lot of conversations, including Amy Pascal, the chief producer, Jon [Watts], and Kevin [Feige]. And I would say that there have been discussions regarding the prospect of Sandman being in a later version of it. There has been discussion about him returning and possibly picking up a more satisfying story with Flint and returning to human form rather than merely being Sandman, as there was a story like that.”
In Spider-Man: No Way Home, the renowned actor said that “there’s a reason” Sandman “couldn’t be human” and that he and Watts have “talked about the possibility in the future that [the character] can come back as Flint Marko” later on:
“There’s a reason he can’t be human in ‘No Way Home,’ until the very end when you just see him very briefly, which is actually a screen grab from ‘Spider-Man 3,’ because they kind of wanted to be that throwback thing, where you see him the way he was, and because… there’s a chain of events where he could not be human. So now… We’ve discussed the potential of Jon returning as Flint Marko in the future. That has been mentioned, so, yeah.
Where in the MCU Does Sandman Make Sense?
At the conclusion of Spider-Man: No Way Home, Thomas Haden Church’s Sandman/Flint Marko and the other Mutliversal villains appeared to have said their final goodbyes, and it appeared as though that version of the character had reached the end of the story.
That does not appear to be the case, though, if these “conversations” ever result in something.
There is, of course, always the possibility that he returns to portray Earth-616 Sandman in the eventual Tom Holland-directed Spider-Man 4. There hasn’t been a confirmed antagonist for that movie, and given that the sequel is expected to be a more “street-level” Spider-Man story, Sandman would be the ideal major antagonist for the web-slinger to face up against.
The possibility that this character will show up someplace in the Sony Spider-Man Universe appears more feasible. Church’s comment about being able to write a “more satisfying story with Flint” has a lot of “villain-focused” solo movie vibes surrounding it.
Hence, if Church’s comeback as Sandman is genuinely going to happen, something more along the lines of Venom, Morbius, and Kraven the Hunter feels like the better probability to occur. Sandman (and, in turn, Flint Marko) may also appear in a Spiderman movie proper.
Both Spider-Man 3 and Spider-Man: No Way Home, which are available for purchase in the majority of digital stores, features Thomas Haden Church’s, Flint Marko.
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