The superhero movie veteran addresses Johnson’s viral comments.
For better or for worse, Madame Web has become one of the most talked-about movies to be released in 2024. Even beyond the film itself, the project has inspired a lot of viral attention thanks to the comments from its stars, particularly Cassandra Webb / Madame Web actress Dakota Johnson. In a March interview, Johnson admitted that Madame Web exposed her to the pratfalls of movies “made by committees.” In a recent interview with GQ, superhero movie veteran Russell Crowe — who next stars in this winter’s Kraven the Hunter — was asked about Johnson’s comments.
“I don’t want to make any comments to what anybody else might have said or what their experience is, but… you’re bringing out the impish quality of my humour,” Crowe answered with a laugh. “You’re telling me you signed up for a Marvel movie, and some f-cking universe for cartoon characters… and you didn’t get enough pathos? Not quite sure how I can make this better for you. It’s a gigantic machine, and they make movies at a certain size. And you know, I’ve experienced that on the DC side with Man of Steel, Zack Snyder, and I’ve experienced it on the Marvel side via Disney with Thor: Love and Thunder. And I’ve also experienced the [Sony-produced] Marvel dark universe with Kraven the Hunter. These are jobs. You know: here’s your role, play the role. If you’re expecting this to be some kind of life-changing event, I just think you’re here for the wrong reasons.”
In Kraven the Hunter, Russian immigrant Sergei Kravinoff is on a mission to prove that he is the greatest hunter in the world. The film will star Aaron Taylor-Johnson as Sergei Kravinoff / Kraven, Arana DeBose as Calypso, and Fred Heichinger as Dmitri Smerdyakov / Chameleon. Christopher Abbott, Alessandro Nivola, Russell Crowe, and Levi Miller have been cast in currently-unknown roles.
“He is a hunter and from that world of hunting and there’s so many aspects,” Taylor-Johnson told ComicBook.com in an interview last year. “What I love about that character is that what is he humanizing is that he has flaws, right? Kraven is a beautiful character. Sergei Kravinov is a beautiful character because it’s someone who’s really understanding themselves and has flaws. This is a character that was built ages ago and it’s in a new time and era, but yeah, is he going to be the hunter that we all want to see? Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.”
Will There Be a Madame Web Sequel?
After Madame Web‘s critical and financial performance, and amid the ever-evolving nature of Sony’s Spider-Man Universe, no sequel or follow-up has officially been confirmed. Still, the film had a lot of story elements left still unexplored, including the origin story of Julia and the other Spider-Women.
“Well, I thought it would be a bit greedy to do four origin stories,” director S.J. Clarkson explained to ComicBook.com‘s Phase Zero podcast. “That’s not really fair, is it? I’ve got to share it. Come on. I mean, first and foremost, it’s Madame Web, right? But I hope the exciting thing about it is, this is a tease. And I think the origin story of the girls, we’re given, hopefully, a hint of the spirit of who they are. We’ve tried to stick to the spirit from the comic books, and draw from that and find out who they are and get a little bit of their sass and a little bit of their character coming through. But that’s a lot of story to tell, I think, in one [movie]. And I think it wouldn’t do any of them justice to try and sort of crowbar or cram it all into one movie.”