Prime Video has cancelled Spider-Noir with Nicolas Cage. Two days later, the series picked up five Emmy Awards!
On paper, Spider-Noir had everything. Nicolas Cage as an ageing spider detective, a stylish noir aesthetic, enthusiastic critics and 11 Emmy nominations, the most of any Prime Video title this year. One thing it lacks, though: a second season. As Variety was first to report, Amazon cancelled the series after eight episodes and a single season. Yet the series holds 92% from critics on Rotten Tomatoes and Britain's Empire gave it a full five stars.
Five Emmys two days after the cancellation
The timing could not have been more ironic. News of the show's end came on Friday 4 September, and on Sunday 6 September Spider-Noir took home five statuettes at the Creative Arts Emmys: for cinematography in a one-hour series, sound editing in a comedy or drama series, stunt coordination for comedy programming, main title design and special visual effects in a single episode. The academy members' voting took place long before the cancellation was announced, so it had no influence on the results. The main ceremony of the 78th Emmy Awards takes place on 14 September and will be hosted by Mariska Hargitay.
Why Amazon pulled the emergency brake
No official reason for the cancellation was given. According to Nielsen, the series racked up 2.6 billion minutes viewed in the US in its first six weeks, a decent but not overwhelming figure. It also dropped out of the daily Top 10 chart on Prime Video fairly quickly. Set against that are high production costs. Spider-Noir was made in two full versions, colour and black-and-white. Streaming services decide on renewals mainly on the basis of value for money, and this time that calculation apparently did not work out.
One season is perfect
The leading man, however, is taking it in his stride. Back at the time of the premiere, Cage hinted that he was not sure whether the series would get a continuation, but that he was happy with the first season. And he has a point. The eight episodes tell a more or less self-contained story with only a few loose threads, so fans are not left hanging in the middle of the plot. “Whether it happens or not, all of us achieved what we set out to do, and it works on its own,” Cage told Variety at the time of the premiere when asked whether the series would get a second season.
“For me, one season is perfect, having said what I wanted to say with this dangerous, innovative, pop-art Spider-Man. Onwards, upwards, inwards,” Nicolas Cage said in a statement to Deadline.
What Spider-Noir was about
The series brought to live action a character Cage first voiced in the animated hit Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse. Ben Reilly is an ageing private detective in 1930s New York, at the time of the Great Depression. He was once the city's only superhero, known as The Spider, but after a personal tragedy he hung up the mask. When a new case drags him into a web of mobsters, monsters and one mysterious femme fatale, he has to face his past as well as the feared gangster Silverman, played by Brendan Gleeson. The creators also put their own spin on comic-book characters such as Black Cat and Robbie Robertson.
The cast also featured Lamorne Morris, Li Jun Li, Karen Rodriguez, Abraham Popoola and Jack Huston. The series was created by showrunners Oren Uziel and Steve Lightfoot, and the executive producers included Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, the creators of the animated spider trilogy, as well as former Sony chief Amy Pascal. The first two episodes were directed by Harry Bradbeer. Spider-Noir premiered at the end of May on the MGM+ channel and was released in full on Prime Video immediately afterwards. For Cage it was his very first lead role in a television series.
“I wanted to go back to those old films from the 30s and 40s, put on something by Howard Hawks and pick up the speed at which the actors of the time spoke. I was also thinking of Double Indemnity with Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck and tried to embody its essence, mannerisms and vocal delivery and collide them with Stan Lee's masterpiece, Spider-Man, to see what spark it would strike,” Cage told Deadline in June, describing his preparation for the role.
“A bit like a Roy Lichtenstein painting. I wanted to do something that would be new for me and hopefully for the viewer too,” Cage added.
Sony and Amazon carry on
Spider-Noir was the first series to come out of the collaboration between Amazon and Sony Pictures Television on projects from the so-called Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters. Under it, Sony manages more than 900 Marvel characters connected to Spider-Man. The cancellation of Spider-Noir does not mean the end of the partnership, however; both sides are continuing to develop several projects, and according to Deadline one of them is said to be close to an official green light.
Cage will return to the spider yet
Fans of Spider-Noir will not go entirely empty-handed. Nicolas Cage is in the cast of the animated finale of the trilogy, Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse, which arrives in Czech cinemas on 17 June 2027. And Cage will soon be back on Prime Video in the biopic Madden, in which he plays the legendary American football coach and commentator John Madden.
WHERE TO WATCH: streaming on Prime Video (colour and black-and-white versions)
Sources: Variety, Deadline, Empire Online, The Hollywood Reporter, TVLine, TV Insider, Gold Derby, ComicBook.com