Deadline’s Read the Screenplay series spotlighting the year’s most talked-about scripts continues with Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, the follow-up to Sony, Sony Pictures Imageworks and Marvel’s groundbreaking Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse which won the Animated Feature Oscar in 2019.
Phil Lord returned to co-script the sequel with his Lord Miller cohort Christopher Miller and Dave Callaham. Joaquim Del Santos, Kemp Powers and Justin K. Powers directed the ambitious sequel, which featured multiple animation styles and more than 280 variations of Spider-Man.
This plot centers on continuing the exploits of Miles Morales as Brooklyn’s own Spider-Man. Reunited with Gwen Stacy, he is catapulted across the Multiverse where he encounters a team of Spider-People — from Lego Spider-Man and Mumbattan’s Pavitr Prabhakar to the Daniel Kaluuya-voiced Spider-Punk — charged with protecting its existence. But the heroes clash on how to handle a new threat, the Spot, and Miles finds himself pitted against the other Spideys and must redefine what it means to be a hero so he can save the people he loves most.
Shameik Moore returns as the voice of Miles as does Hailee Steinfeld as Gwen, Jake Johnson as Peter B. Parker, Mahershala Ali, Luna Lauren Valdez and Brian Tyree Henry. Jason Schwartzman voices Spot, and the loaded voice cast also includes Oscar Isaac, Issa Rae, Greta Lee, Amandla Stenberg, Jharrel Jerome, Karan Soni and Andy Samberg among others.
Lord said during Deadline’s Contenders Film: Los Angeles that the challenge was trying to go beyond the groundbreaking original.
“When your brand is surprise and innovation, it means you have to start over because you can’t run it back. We all got together and said, ‘What’s something even more ambitious? How could we create looks and worlds that are completely surprising in animation and are groundbreaking as equally as the previous movie?’ he said. “But really, it was about how can we go deeper in the character’s relationships? How can we make this film a more complete emotional experience?”
The pic opened in June and has grossed $690.5 million at the global box office. A third pic in the series, Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse, originally expected in 2024, has been delayed because of the SAG-AFTRA strike.
Click below to read the Across the Spider-Verse script.
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