Willem Dafoe again used prosthetic teeth in the role of Norman Osborn; as the Green Goblin personality, his own teeth were visible.
To keep the set secret, Dafoe covered his costume with a cloak. Tom Holland bumped into the cloaked Dafoe, and that is how the two met.
Alfred Molina was digitally de-aged; his mechanical arms were created with CGI, not puppetry.
Rhys Ifans and Thomas Haden Church returned to their roles only with their voices; their characters were represented with CGI and appeared in human form only at the end of the film. Stock footage from the previous films was used.
Set footage of Andrew Garfield leaked months earlier. In the silent footage, Garfield could be seen leaning against a scarecrow in his costume, saying, 'Do you ever get web blockage?' The footage turned out to be real.
Charlie Cox said that he and Andrew Garfield sat facing the wall during lunch: 'We both said, 'Damn, if we're seen together here, that's not a good sign.''
MJ works at the real Peter Pan Donut & Pastry Shop in Brooklyn. Because the film was shot in Georgia, a reproduction of the location was built. The real employees are excited to be part of the MCU.
Tom Holland began shooting No Way Home two days after finishing Uncharted; however, No Way Home was released first.
The Green Goblin's pointed helmet is destroyed. His new equipment includes battle-damaged armor, a mask resembling Doc Ock's goggles and a torn purple hooded sweatshirt; this resembles Alex Ross's unused concept.
Sony discovered that the digital data for Doc Ock from Spider-Man 2 had been lost; the animators started from scratch. Because of Molina's aging, more digital de-aging was done than planned.
Doc Ock's trench coat was brought closer to the colors in Ultimate Spider-Man; it is still more realistic than the depictions in the mainstream Marvel Universe.
When the Green Goblin throws spinning blades, Tom Holland's Spider-Man repeats the evasive move from Tobey Maguire's Spider-Man; Maguire and Garfield also make a similar move.
In The Amazing Spider-Man, the Lizard has four fingers on his right claw; this continuity detail was preserved.
According to VFX Supervisor Kelly Port, only 80 shots in the film do not contain visual effects.
Electro says the energy in the MCU is different; this explains why his power is golden (in the previous universe it was blue).
Michael Giacchino's Doctor Strange theme plays when Peter decides to ask Strange for help, when Strange chases him through the Mirror Dimension, and in the final act.
Ned's grandmother speaks Tagalog (the most widely spoken language in the Philippines).
Matt Murdock informs Peter that the charges will be dropped and tells Happy that he is under investigation because of missing Stark Tech; Peter finds a hidden Stark fabricator in Happy's apartment.
When Peter encounters Electro and Sandman, he wears his non-nano suit inside out; the suit looks black but its internal electronics are exposed. Aunt May later cleans it.
Matt Murdock catches a brick thrown through Peter's kitchen window. It was actually a snow globe; in the film, the bulge in Matt's palm and Peter taking the object can be seen.
The final battle takes place at the Statue of Liberty while it is under restoration; Captain America's shield has been added to its torch. The statue is in its original copper color, as when it was completed in 1886, not its bluish-green patina.
In the scene where Peter, MJ and Ned chase the MIT Vice-Chancellor's car on the highway to find him (around the 27th minute), his costume is wrinkled. It was Tom Holland's idea: for it to wrinkle under the Iron Spider suit.
Michael Giacchino's music includes his own themes from the previous two Spider-Man films and Doctor Strange, as well as themes from past films: the main themes by Danny Elfman and James Horner, the Green Goblin theme (2002), the Doc Ock theme (2004), the Electro theme (2014) and a subtle nod to Sandman's theme. Mysterio's theme is also heard at the beginning of the film.
The main musical motifs of the previous two film series, 'Responsibility' and 'Promises,' are heard together before transitioning into the MCU's character theme.
When Strange takes the box back from the Green Goblin (around 1h 50m), each Spider-Man's Spider-Sense kicks in and it is revealed that the Goblin slipped a Pumpkin Bomb into the box.
Zendaya throwing bread at Andrew Garfield to test his spider-sense (around 1h 25m) was an improvisation.
The film was shot over a period of two months.
Plans to use the original Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield Spider-Man costumes were shelved for the two actors' comfort.
Benedict Cumberbatch returned to London to shoot Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness immediately after filming his scenes in Atlanta.
The eye lights on Doc Ock's arms glow blue when Spider-Man controls them remotely, white when Otto controls them, and red when the arm's artificial intelligence takes control. In Spider-Man 2, only white and red were seen; blue was added as a reference to Bluetooth connections.
Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield and Tom Holland shot their scenes together in only two weeks.
Director Jon Watts found the idea for the final scene in which Andrew Garfield saves MJ while watching a previsualization reel prepared for the climactic battle.
J.K. Simmons never met Tom Holland.
This is the second Spider-Man film in which Stan Lee did not make a cameo; the first was Spider-Man: Far from Home. Lee died on November 12, 2018; Avengers: Endgame was his last 'real' cameo. In the 1970s SHIELD base scene in Endgame, his face was recreated with motion capture.
Charlie Cox recounted that while filming his cameo as Matt Murdock, director Jon Watts told him to pause for the applause he expected from the audience. Cox said, "I told the director, 'This is strange, why are you doing this? It feels like I should be talking.' He said, 'No, because people are going to be so excited.' I thought, 'Really? This could be a big disappointment.'"
During the briefing before the trial, Matt Murdock asked Happy a question. Jon Favreau improvised the line "I've been a little foggy on the details from time to time" as a joke. (Favreau had played Franklin "Foggy" Nelson in Daredevil (2003).) The line did not make the final cut.
The laboratory scenes required old-school visual tricks because Zendaya was taller than Tom Holland and Tobey Maguire and was adjusted to appear shorter than them.
The terrified expression on Paula Newsome's character's face as she is trapped in a car hanging off a bridge was real (around the 31st minute). The actress found herself on a real rig suspended in the air.
Director Jon Watts served as Thomas Haden Church's stunt double on set and provided motion capture reference for the unnamed double who physically portrayed Church's role.
Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau) uses a CPAP mask while sleeping (around the 10th minute). This is a medical device rarely seen on a film character; it stands for Continuous Positive Airway Pressure and treats sleep disorders.
The film opens with a special version of the Marvel Studios Fanfare, played with solo timpani and first heard in Doctor Strange (2016). Composer Michael Giacchino also scored this film as well as the first two MCU Spider-Man films.
The melancholy piece playing in the scene where Peter talks to May (around 1 hour 19 minutes) is a slower version of the Daredevil (2015) Netflix theme.
When we first see J.K. Simmons as J. Jonah Jameson (around the 5th minute), he is presenting news revealing Spider-Man's identity in a green-walled chroma key studio in front of a wall covered in Spider-Man post-it notes. Later, he appears in a proper Daily Bugle studio.
Fourteen different companies worked on the film's visual effects: Digital Domain, Cinesite, Framestore, Luma Pictures, Folks VFX, Crafty Apes VFX, SSVFX, Mr. X, Sony Pictures Imageworks, Monsters Aliens Robots Zombies VFX and Stereo D.
This is the second MCU film, after Captain America: The First Avenger (2011), to include a trailer in its post-credits scene.
The film contains a total of 2,500 VFX shots; most of them are concentrated in the action scenes.
After the credits (around 2 hours 25 minutes) there is a teaser for Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022). Dr. Strange appears alongside Wanda Maximoff and Mordo (Chiwetel Ejiofor). This is Ejiofor's return to the role of Mordo six years after the first Doctor Strange (2016).
In a VFX breakdown video made with Vanity Fair, VFX Supervisor Kelly Port explains that they initially planned a more action-packed introduction for Willem Dafoe's Green Goblin. In a 'previs' sequence, Spider-Man and the Green Goblin were planned to have a longer fight on the bridge, unlike their version in the film.
Even a few weeks before the film's release, visual effects were still being worked on and final touches were being made.
The original cinematographer was Seamus McGarvey, but he had to leave the production after testing positive for Covid-19; Mauro Fiore replaced him.
The film is said to have boosted and improved IMAX's numbers during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The film grossed 37 million dollars domestically on its first Monday, surpassing Spider-Man 2 (2004) with 28 million dollars and leaving all other Sony films behind.
This is the fifth comic book film to receive an 'A+' from CinemaScore, after The Avengers (2012), Black Panther (2018), Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) and Avengers: Endgame (2019).
It is the first Spider-Man film to gross over 200 million dollars domestically in its opening weekend and the second solo MCU film to achieve this, after Black Panther (2018).
The film was the year's best-selling video release in the United States in 2022, selling 2 million copies.
It grossed 601 million dollars worldwide in its opening weekend, the third-biggest global opening in history after Avengers: Endgame (1.2 billion dollars) and Avengers: Infinity War (2018) (641 million dollars). As of 2025, these are the only three films to have grossed over 600 million dollars worldwide in their opening weekends.
The 10th film to gross over 1.5 billion dollars worldwide, after Titanic (1997), Avatar (2009), The Avengers (2012), Furious 7 (2015), Jurassic World (2015), Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (2015), Avengers: Infinity War (2018), Avengers: Endgame (2019) and The Lion King (2019).
As of 2024, this is one of three MCU films on the IMDb Top 250; the other two are Avengers: Infinity War (2018) and Avengers: Endgame (2019). Nine other MCU films were also on the list at one point: Iron Man (2008), The Avengers (2012), Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), Guardians of the Galaxy (2014), Captain America: Civil War (2016), Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 2 (2017), Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023) and Deadpool & Wolverine (2024).
This popular box-office juggernaut will have its television broadcast on BBC 1 England on Thursday, 31 July 2025, at 23.40.
Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, it was the only film to gross 1 billion dollars worldwide in 2021. This was the first year since 2014 with a single billion-dollar film; in 2014 there was Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014).
It became the fifth film to exceed 100 million dollars domestically on its opening day; Star Wars: The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi, Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame had previously joined this club.
It became the second film distributed by a studio other than Disney to pass 200 million dollars domestically in its opening weekend; only Jurassic World had achieved this before.
Stunt coordinator George Cottle said that, because Alfred Molina moved his arms so much, he wore a safety harness for 90 percent of his time on set.