By Owen Carson | Broadcast Reporter
2026 has been a big year for movies.
Five movies have crossed the coveted $1 billion mark at the box office. The biggest movie, however, has been “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” from Marvel Studios, which has made just over $1.2 billion since being released July 31.
It follows Peter Parker as he navigates grief and the thankless line of work of being Spider-Man. This is a movie that doesn’t bring in many heroes or a cosmic villain, but at the core is your friendly neighborhood superhero dealing with issues that are a part of common human experiences.
While the movie features phenomenal fight scenes and superhuman powers, what makes this movie stand out is its ability to attract audiences into another story of Spider-Man that feels unique, yet digestible.
Marvel accomplishes this while introducing the new character of Jean Grey, who for fans of the comics, is a wildly powerful and impactful character.
Jean Grey is a part of the mutant’s saga and more importantly the “X-Men” which President of Marvel Kevin Feige said is confirmed to be released as a standalone film in 2028.
Introducing new heroes after the events of “Avengers: Endgame” has been a difficult task for marvel, oftentimes using the streaming service Disney Plus to produce shows such as “Ironheart,” “Ms. Marvel” or “She-Hulk.” However, none of them are set to return for a season 2.
Marvel will often create long extensive story arcs for its new characters in order to introduce them as a main player later on. That is development with the intention of introduction, where instead, the formula that worked with Jean Grey was introduction with the possibility of developing later.
Grey wasn’t the main character, Spider-Man was. She didn’t have to carry the movie and she didn’t have a big story arc because the focus wasn’t on her.
Jean Grey’s motivations were clear from the start. She was labeled and shown as very powerful, and she was inserted smoothly into the Spider-Man universe. These are things that lead to a successful introduction.
Secondly, Grey was introduced in a movie; not a show that viewers have to wait a week for around 40 minutes of content. Movies are still the best way to draw people into consuming produced and developed content for a screen.
What can marvel do in order to be successful with new future characters? If it’s just one character, explore the possibility of introducing them in a movie with a character who is well liked and established among the audience.
This allows our new hero to not be pressured into carrying a story and allows the already known characters to have an impact outside of their own lives.
Most importantly, limit the TV shows and make it a priority to introduce new characters on the big screen for audiences to see. Marvel seems to be taking a step in the right direction after recently announcing that the new character of Ghost Rider will be getting his own stand-alone movie set to release in 2028.
Marvel can have the same success it saw less than a decade ago by just learning from what audiences responded well too. “Spider-Man: Brand New Day” is a great place to start.
