With Spider-Man: No Way Home on the horizon, there have been a lot of reasons for fans to look back at the previous incarnations of Spider-Man movies. For many, Andrew Garfield‘s take on Peter Parker in the Amazing Spider-Man movies was a definite favorite, with Garfield starring in two films before the franchise partnered with Marvel Studios and rebooted yet again. In the years that have followed, Garfield has spoken somewhat candidly about his experience on the franchise, including in a recent interview with The Guardian.
“I went from being a naive boy to growing up,” Garfield explained in the interview. “How could I ever imagine that it was going to be a pure experience? There are millions of dollars at stake and that’s what guides the ship. It was a big awakening and it hurt. Comic-Con in San Diego is full of grown men and women still in touch with that pure thing the character meant to them. [But] you add in market forces and test groups and suddenly the focus is less on the soul of it and more on ensuring we make as much money as possible. And I found that – find that – heartbreaking in all matters of the culture. Money is the thing that has corrupted all of us and led to the terrible ecological collapse that we are all about to die under.”
“I’m just kidding, I’m just kidding!” Garfield added with a laugh, before continuing, “I mean, it’ll take a bunch of years before that happens.”
Garfield made similar comments in an interview with Total Film earlier this fall, revealing why he “wasn’t satisfied” with his previous work as Spider-Man, or his turn in the film The Social Network.
“I don’t know about reincarnation, and if there is one opportunity for me to be alive, and I get offered the opportunity to do a prolonged dress-up as my favorite character of all time, there’s no way I can say no,” Garfield explained. “And, yeah, the only thing that I knew was going to be a challenge was the fame aspect, and I knew that a lot of good would come with that as well. I knew it was going to provide a gilded prison… As a creative person, I knew I would have to balance it out with theatre, and with waiting for the right movies to come along that would make sure that I stayed an actor, rather than this idea of a movie star. I love movie stars. I love The Rock. I f-cking love Tom Cruise. This is in no way a detriment to them.”
“I’m very rarely satisfied with how something turns out. I suffer from that kind of queer, divine dissatisfaction that most creative people have,” Garfield continued. “I remember watching The Social Network for the first time, and me and Jesse were like, ‘Oh, we hate this sh-t. We hate it.’ Everyone around us was going, ‘What the f-ck is wrong with you? It’s incredible.’ We were like, ‘No. I ruined it. They should have cast someone else.'”