Tom Holland says one of the best parts of Spider-Man: Brand New Day is the way Spider-Man and the Punisher are going to play off each other, and he says the result is unlike what was originally on the page. The actor called sharing the screen with Jon Bernthal “so fun” and said the new relationship between Peter Parker and Frank Castle could become something audiences see again.
That tease matters because Brand New Day is the next live-action Spider-Man film in the MCU after Spider-Man: No Way Home, the movie that ended with Doctor Strange erasing Peter Parker’s identity from everyone’s memory. Four years later, Peter has kept swinging anonymously, MJ and Ned no longer remember him, and the new film picks up with that self-imposed isolation still hanging over him.
Holland made the comments during Collider’s Exclusive Summer Preview series, where he said the Punisher is one of his favorite parts of the film. Bernthal is set to make his first MCU theatrical appearance as Frank Castle, adding a new kind of partner to Peter’s world at a moment when the character is still trying to hold his life together. Holland said director Destin Daniel Cretton gave them room to reshape the relationship and build something special, rather than sticking closely to the original script.
That freedom appears to have changed the film in a meaningful way. Holland said the onscreen dynamic is “very different” from what was on the page, which hints that the Spider-Man-Punisher pairing will not be a simple team-up or a standard crossover cameo. It also fits the film’s darker framing: Brand New Day is being described as one of Spider-Man’s most emotional and grim adventures yet, with Peter even starting to lose control of his powers while the Punisher arrives as an ally who can help him.
Bernthal is already due back as Frank Castle in The Punisher: One Last Kill before Brand New Day, and his return has momentum of its own after We Bury The Dead: Jon Bernthal’s Punisher special tops Rotten Tomatoes. But the bigger draw for Marvel fans may be the possibility that this film plants the seed for a recurring duo. Holland said he would not be surprised if Spider-Man and the Punisher keep crossing paths, and that is the clearest sign yet that Brand New Day is trying to turn a one-off pairing into something with a future.
If that happens, it will not be because the film copied the script. It will be because Holland and Bernthal found a new version of two very different Marvel characters that works better once they are in the same room.
