By Jonathan Klotz
| Published
It’s been an up and down week for Nicolas Cage. On Friday, his Amazon series Spider-Noir was canceled after one incredible season. On Sunday, that same series won five Creative Arts Emmys. It’s also been nominated for six more Emmys, making its total count 11 nominations making it the most nominated Amazon Original of the year. Yet, it was unceremoniously canceled by the streamer despite the critical response. Spider-Noir managed to defy the typical quality of Sony’s live-action Spider-Man spinoffs, and yet suffered the same fate: right into the dustbin of history.
Spider-Noir Defied Expectations
The fact that Spider-Noir happened in the first place is a miracle. Nicolas Cage as a 1920’s Spider-Man with hard-boiled detective dialogue straight out of a Raymond Chandler novel sounds like an insane fever dream. Into The Spider-Verse made it a reality, it was animated, but the casting happened. Even then, it didn’t feel real. It was too perfect.
Spider-Noir, especially in black and white, looked like a million bucks which is why it cleaned up at the Creative Arts Emmys. Cage plays Ben Reily, a retired vigilante working as a private investigator who frequently finds himself working for criminals, going up against Silvermane, The Sandman, and Tombstone. It’s a refreshing change of pace from Sony’s other Spider-Man adjacent projects. What Morbius and Madame Web lack in personality and style, Spider-Noir has it in spades. And it was still canceled.
Talking about the cancelation afterwards, Nicolas Cage said to Deadline that “For me, one season is perfect, having said what I wanted to say with this dangerous, innovative, pop-art Spider-Man. Onwards, upwards, inwards.” Spider-Noir’s first, and only season, is a work of art. It was Cage’s first time as the lead of a television series. Hopefully it wasn’t his last time.
A Record-Setting Debut Wasn’t Enough
Cage’s decision to play Ben Reily as a “spider cosplaying as a man” gives the entire series an offbeat, bizarre energy that permeates the entire production. His performance was praised by critics and fans alike, or at least, the fans who showed up. Amazon didn’t cite the lack of an audience as to why Spider-Noir was canceled, at least, not domestically. The series had over 8 billion minutes viewed in the first six weeks, making it one of Amazon’s biggest hits of the year.
The problem was the show’s lack of international appeal. Spider-Man is popular worldwide, The Spider is not. Well that, and the other reason Amazon canceled the series is the high production cost. Turns out a series where every frame looks like a million bucks will cost millions for every episode. That’s part of the equation when streamers are deciding what lives and dies. Which raises the question why Rings of Power survived Season 1 to give us the much improved Season 2, yet Spider-Noir doesn’t have the same opportunity.
Spider-Man: Brand New Day is one of the most successful movies in history, earning over $2 billion at the box office, while every Spider-Man adjacent project with no Spider-Man has failed. The Spider-Verse movies have Peter B. Parker which is still more than Morbius, Kraven, Madame Web, and Spider-Noir’s Ben is very much not the traditional Peter Parker. The draw isn’t the world of Spider-Man, it’s Spider-Man, whether it’s Peter or Miles Morales. No matter how many Emmys it winds up winning, Spider-Noir is ultimately another casualty that proves what fans want is the real Spider-Man.
