With the release of Marvel Studios The Marvel Cinematic Universe: An Official Timeline, the studio is trying to dispel a great deal of confusion surrounding the MCU timeline. Finally, the official MCU timeline book has helped to clear up one of Marvel Studios’ biggest continuity errors from Tom Holland’s Spider-Man: Homecoming.
Following his 2016 film Captain America: Civil War debut as the MCU’s Peter Parker, a.k.a. Spider-Man, Holland embarked on his first solo adventure in 2017’s Spider-Man: Homecoming. According to the book, Spider-Man: Homecoming‘s opening flashback, which shows Adrian Toomes and his team escaping the Battle of New York, occurred in 2012.
The rest of the movie is set in the ‘fall of 2016’. But the 2017 Jon Watts movie’s timecard after the opening flashback read ‘8 Years Later’, which put the majority of the film in 2020.
This is the first time Marvel has formally taken action to correct the timeline error, even though Kevin Feige and other MCU filmmakers have previously discussed the continuity error.
The Official MCU Timeline Book Admits a Major Mistake in Tom Holland’s Spider-Man: Homecoming
Marvel Studios’ The Marvel Cinematic Universe: An Official Timeline (per The Direct), released on October 24, 2023, finally corrected a major mistake in the MCU’s timeline.
In Tom Holland‘s Spider-Man: Homecoming‘s opening flashback, Adrian Toomes and his team perform a salvage operation, clearing out the alien technology left over from the battle between the Avengers and Loki. This pivotal conflict is also referred to as the Battle of New York in The Avengers.
Although this scene is supposed to have taken place in 2012, the action then jumps to the present day, and the timecard is later shown on screen saying “8 Years Later” in a bold manner. However, since Spider-Man: Homecoming was scheduled for the fall of 2016, it would be impossible given the short four-year timeframe.
And in the book, that is exactly how things are made clear. “Spring 2012” and “Fall 2016” are the respective times when the events of Toomes’ flashback and the remainder of the movie take place.
The timecard was previously mentioned by Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige in 2017 (via CinemaBlend), who stated that it “was not meant to flummox anyone”:
“All of that debate has made us go, ‘Okay, at some point, I’m not sure exactly when, we’re going to publish a timeline and see what it all is.’ It wasn’t meant to flummox anybody exactly, and I’m not sure I’d do it again the same way, but it does all connect to where we placed it.”
Fans’ Reactions to Spider-Man: Homecoming Plot Error
As expected, fans were quick to point out the embarrassing mistake and voice their opinions on Twitter after the blunder finally came to light. One agreed with the revelation by saying:
Right. Even with the time jump, the movie came out in 2018 and the 5 year snap didn’t happen until after the events of homecoming so idk how they got the math wrong. Unless they are implying that the ending took place after the snap and were trying to say they can see the future
— Quis ΦΒΣ (@iBasicallyQuis) October 26, 2023
Other chimed:
y’all really pay attention to this stuff that closely .. wow
— eruj (@erujabidi) October 26, 2023
One person expressed surprise at how long it took them to “confirm” this:
Took them that long to confirm? We been knowing this 💀
— Bean (@_Saiiikoo_) October 26, 2023
One questions how Marvel could have made such a serious mistake:
How did Marvel screw up this much. They are a massive company yet they can’t see this minor issue…???
— Ankush sharma (@Aku_700) October 26, 2023
One fan advised that they should release “Special Editions” of every movie:
They should do a Special Edition of all of the films to
-Make the opening Marvel logos consistent and evolving
-Fix various detail mistakes like these
-Remove all references and appearances of Captain Marvel from the Infinity Saga— Create Greatness (@CreateGreatnes1) October 26, 2023
At the global box office, Spider-Man: Homecoming brought in over $880 million, making it the second most successful Spider-Man movie and the sixth highest-grossing movie of 2017. Its two sequels are Spider-Man: Far From Home and Spider-Man: No Way Home.
You can watch Spider-Man: Homecoming on Disney+.
