Russell Crowe has already fathered a Superman. He’ll soon hang out with Thor. And now it seems he might eventually share a screen with a web-slinger. Crowe has reportedly been cast in Kraven the Hunter, a film based on the popular Spider-Man villain that’ll star Aaron Taylor-Johnson in the lead role and be directed by J.C. Chandor. There’s no word on who Crowe will be playing but “many of the main characters are said to be Kraven’s family members.”
That’s according to the Hollywood Reporter, which broke the news. Kraven the Hunter is currently scheduled for release January 12, 2023, which will put it after not just Morbius, but Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse Part One in terms of Sony’s Spider-Man Universe. That universe also includes the Venom films, an upcoming Madame Web film, and maybe even one of three versions of Spider-Man himself, as seen in Spider-Man: No Way Home.
Crowe, who won an Oscar for his role in Gladiator, is no stranger to superhero films. Don’t forget, he played Jor-El in Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel back in 2013 he’s expected to appear as Zeus in Taika Waititi’s Thor: Love and Thunder, which is out in July. And now with Kraven, he joins the ultra-rare MSD Club. A thing we just made up because he’ll have appeared not just in the DC Universe and Marvel Cinematic Universe, but the Sony Spider-Verse as well. All the verses for Russell Crowe.
Kraven the Hunter was written by Art Marcum and Matt Holloway and Richard Wenk, with Avi Arad and Matt Tolmach producing. There’s no word on how or if the film will cross over into the Spider-Verse, but you’d expect it to largely be an origin story (like Venom and Morbius) that will potentially set up multiple crossover in the future. Taylor-Johnson signed a multi-picture deal when he was cast.