After a long process filled with casting woes and a battle between studios, Marvel and Sony have officially crowned their new Spider-Man. Nineteen-year-old Tom Holland of The Impossible and the upcoming In the Heart of the Sea is joining the MCU and will make his first appearance in Captain America: Civil War, alongside Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr., Chadwick Boseman and a whole slew of new and returning characters. To welcome his new comrade into the Marvel fold, Evans took to Twitter to congratulate the young actor.
Evans is busy reprising his role as the star-spangled Avenger on the set of Civil War. As Holland is making his way to work alongside this Marvel movie vet, Evans took some time for a celebratory tweet. And, as opposed to all the haters responding to it, the actor seems pretty stoked to have Holland come aboard. According to reports, Holland had the opportunity to work alongside Evans during his extended audition process.

The race was said to be down to Holland and Charlie Rowe. Thankfully, Rowe was a good sport about the matter and he also congratulated Holland on landing the gig.

On Wednesday, Marvel made the official announcement that Holland would succeed Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield as the next live-action web-slinger in a feature film. We don’t know too much about what to expect from this new iteration of the superhero, but the reason such a young actor was cast was to really honor the roots of Spidey being an unpolished, self-trained high school superhero. According to the latest rumors and reports, it looks like this Spider-Man will only have small role to play in Civil War. Nevertheless, Feige said Holland had to immediately report for duty on the set.

Asa Butterfield, Judah Lewis, Matthew Lintz, Charlie Plummer and Charlie Rowe were also up for Spider-Man at one point or another, but it was thanks to a slew of screen tests that helped Marvel and Sony finalize their decision. Downey was flown in to help test his chemistry with the young hopefuls, as Tony Stark reportedly shares scenes with the wall-crawler.

Captain America: Civil War takes its story straight from the comic book arc of the same name. After an international incident involving the Avengers, the governments of the world band together to try and regulate superhuman activity. This new political move splits the Avengers in half into Team Captain America, which opposes the action, and Team Iron Man, which supports it. The film also features the return of Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen, Anthony Mackie, Don Cheadle, Paul Rudd and Frank Grillo, as well as newbies like Boseman, Martin Freeman, Daniel Bruhl and William Hurt. After making his first appearance in Civil War, Holland will go off to star in his own Spider-Man movie, which is set for a theatrical release on July 28, 2017.

Captain America: Civil War hits theaters on May 6, 2016.

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