Spider-Man Fans 'Feel Stupid' After Discovering Key Prop Is Also CGI

The much-anticipated Spider-Man: No Way Home blockbuster soared effortlessly to the top of the box office in 2022 and snatched the No. 3 spot on the list of the highest-grossing movies of all time.

Loved worldwide, the movie has a 98 percent audience score on review-aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes. But one detail has caught people's attention online after a clip from behind-the-scenes footage, due to be released with the digital version of the movie on March 22, went viral on Twitter.

Shared on Wednesday by Twitter user EARTH_96283, the clip showed actors Andrew Garfield and Tobey Maguire filming a scene on set. Before splitting to run in different directions, they both motion to put on an invisible mask. The viral post read: "I knew the masks were CG!"

With over 10,000 retweets and more than 100,000 likes, Spider-Man fans have taken to the internet to discuss the revelation, with another post about the video on Reddit also gaining attention with over 15,000 upvotes.

Made with a budget of $200 million, the movie pulled out all the stops when it came to visual effects. Production visual effects supervisor Kelly Port and colleagues Scott Edelstein, Chris Waegner and Dan Sudic have been nominated for an Oscar in the category of Best Visual Effects for their work on the movie.

The team helped to remake the infamous Doc Ock for a new audience, recreated over 2.5 square miles of New York City in digital rendering, and staged a memorable fight with some of Spider-Man's most well-known villains.

Fans online weren't all pleased to learn about the digital effects used for the iconic masks. One Twitter user wrote: "Why though? This would mean that almost every mask up scene in all Spidey movies is cgi rendered," while another said: "Does the MCU do anything practical?"

Other commenters rushed to defend the creative decision, with one user writing: "For everyone complaining, CGI masks existed since 2007 guys, it's not that deep," while another user wrote: "They do actually wear the mask, but they have a faceplate underneath and a version of the suit with and without the mask built-in. When they take it on or off they have to do the old switcheroo. They've done that since Tobey's Spider-Man."

In fact, in the same behind-the-scenes video we do see shots of the actors wearing real-life Spider-Man masks.

Production visual effects supervisor Kelly Port, who worked on the film, told Newsweek: "The recent Spider-Man films all used a combination of physical costumes and digital replications of those costumes. The simple and primary reason for using a CG or digital version of a costume is entirely down to what is possible, and what looks best within the constraints of a given shot.

"For masks, there is generally a physical component, unless there is a need to pull them on or off very quickly. The real masks don't easily pull on and off quickly, and they usually aren't as flexible, because they have an underlying hard shell to better shape the skull and facial features."

Another commenter on Reddit said: "Not surprised. They had really nice hair whenever they took their masks off," while another user wrote: "I feel stupid because I both never would have believed they CGI'd the masks, and also didn't notice they were never carrying masks they put on."

Update 03/24/22, 06:20 a.m. ET: This article was updated to include comment from Oscar nominated visual effects supervisor on Spider-Man: No Way Home, Kelly Port.