‘MORBIUS’ Trailer: Jared Leto Is Out For Blood, A Surprise MCU Cameo

Sony just dropped its Morbius trailer and boy oh boy, there’s a lot of things to be processed from that two minute and 54-second clip. Fans finally got their first glimpse of Jared Leto as the antihero, but more than that, the trailer served up a lot more surprises than anyone would’ve expected. With a few key and unexpected cameos, the trailer established that Morbius takes place in the MCU and even gives us a rough idea of when it takes place.

Directed by Daniel Espinosa, Morbius stars Leto as a brilliant scientist with a rare blood condition who’s aspirations take him too far off. In the traditional antihero mad scientist introductory fashion, the trailer goes through Morbius’ origin story. Beginning from a bitter childhood of being bullied and ostracized, Morbius rises to the top of his field and earns a Nobel prize. However, his obsession with curing his ailment gets the best of him. As in the trailer, he asks, “How far are we allowed to go to fix something that’s broken?” After taking drastic measures, he turns himself into the Living Vampire, a pseudo vampire with super-strength, hyper-speed, echolocation, and an insatiable thirst for blood.

Morbius Sets Stage For Growing Spider-Verse

In 2019, Disney and Sony’s dispute over the rights of Spider-Man sent the character and the Spider-Man universe to limbo. At one point, the two studios split after failing to come to an agreement. Fortunately, Tom Holland reportedly came to the rescue and helped the two studios come to a consensus that kept the Spiderverse and the MCU connected. However, it has remained unclear for quite some time how these two worlds would crossover. Fans were hoping for a Spider-Man cameo in Sony’s Venom. Unfortunately, that didn’t sail. However, according to The Wrap, people close to the project implied that a meet-up was inevitable. But now, it seems that fans won’t have to wait any longer for that much-awaited cross-over. Kind of, anyway.

Apart from giving fans a glimpse of Morbius’ abilities and his straight from the comics beast form, the trailer left all the juicy bits that reveal its connection to the Spiderverse and the MCU. The first one is a direct visual reference to Spider-Man. While Morbius walks down an alley, we get a quick glimpse of the web slinger’s portrait with the word ‘murderer’ graffitied over it. The Spider-Man image which appears to be from Marvel’s Spider-Man PS4 video game is in itself one thing. But, the word overlaid on it seems to be in direct reference to the events of Spider-Man: Far From Home where Mysterio framed the friendly neighborhood hero for all his crimes.

An even bigger surprise is Michael Keaton’s appearance as Vulture. And it’s not just a one-second glimpse, no. The man spoke to Morbius dropping a casual “What’s up dob?” after asking him if he’s done with all the good guy business. Above everything else, this makes it clear that Morbius exists in the same universe as Tom Holland’s Spider-Man and by extension, the MCU. It’s also leading to a lot of theories that Sony and Marvel are building up to a Sinister Six team-up.

With all these Easter eggs, Morbius becomes the first Sony Spiderverse villain that overtly screams a connection to the MCU. And with it, Sony seems to be strengthening the ties between the current Spider-Man franchise and its extended superhero universe. However, with no official word from both Sony or Marvel, it still remains unclear how close the Spiderverse is to crossing over with the MCU. Morbius will hit theaters this summer on July 31.