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As of this writing, we're just a couple of days away from the premiere of Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, the latest reimagining of the character of Peter Parker brought to you by the X-Men '97 studio of Marvel Animation. And even at this stage in the lead-up, one of fans' most frequently asked questions is: "Is the show canon to the MCU?" Technically, the answer to that is no... but it wasn't always.

Let us explain.

In a recent interview with YouTube channel Phase Hero series executive producer (and Head of Streaming, Television and Animation at Marvel Studios) Brad Winderbaum dropped a pretty interesting tidbit of background knowledge about Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man. It's not just that the show was originally called Spider-Man: Freshman Year (we alreday knew that), but it's that, as it was being developed, the show was meant to fit neatly into the MCU canon, exploring the background of Tom Holland's Spider-Man/Peter Parker.

"Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man," said the creative lead, "started out as [us saying], 'Okay it's Spider-Man: Freshman Year. He's going to be a freshman. Can we get away with this being entirely in the MCU?' And very early on in the development process, we realized how locked in that actually made us."

I know, I know, modern internet vernacular has the phrase "locked in" as a kind of positive, focused thing, but what Winderbaum is depicting here is a kind of cage, a box in which the team's creative limbs couldn't stretch.

"It's like developing anything," he says, "If you staunchly put your flag in the sand, you're like, 'I'm not moving, dammit!,' It becomes a really hard place to develop from. [...] You have to be open to where the project takes you; every single project I've ever worked on - film, television, animated, live-action - they all have a life of their own. If you over discipline them they will turn on you and murder you.”

Ok, I'll admit that the flag thing might've been better than my cage metaphor, but respectfully, Brad, I think murder is maybe a bit dramatic a way to explain the consequences of sticking too close to the MCU. Which is not to say bad things wouldn't happen, as the executive producer lays out quite specifically.

“We couldn't really use his rogues gallery;" says Winderbaum, "we couldn't use aspects of his origin. It was not fun, honestly. We would have to had put so many limiters on our story to get it locked into canon."

A Spider-man story without his rogues does sound pretty dull, we have to admit (not commenting at all on the idea of rogue stories without Spider-Man), even if that means sacrificing that dopamine hit fans get from seeing all the different ways that MCU projects connect to each other. But don't be too worried, True Believer, much of what you love about Tom Holland's Spidey makes an appearance in the series, along with the inspirations that made you love those exact things. 

"Through Jeff [Trammell, series creator]'s vision," Winderbaum concludes, "It does have a lot of DNA that is very similar to the MCU depiction of Tom Holland Spider-Man. But it really also draws all the way back to Steve Ditko, and it really does tell it a standalone story that, like many comic books, is adjacent to the main continuity but really speaks to what's inherent about the character."

Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man comes to Disney+ January 29. 

Marvel's most reliable superhero has proven he can do a whole lot more than just 'whatever a spider can.' Swing into Spidey's history with Popverse's 10 best Spider-Man comic books, our Spider-Man movie watch order, and if you want our opinions on the subject, read our articles ranking Spider-Man's actors and Spider-Man's girlfriends.