Zendaya has been front and center throughout the promo run for “Spider-Man: Homecoming,” even though its trailer offered no answers to the questions swirling around the true nature of her role. While Zendaya has said she would’ve done the movie if she had one line, a new report makes it sound like she doesn’t have many more than that.
A new piece from Vulture outlines Zendaya’s real role in the film. Despite the controversy about her being Spider-Man’s romantic lead, Mary-Jane Watson, she’s actually just comic relief.
“Zendaya’s character, Michelle, is one of several high-schoolers in Peter Parker’s loose-knit friend group, popping up every so often at the end of a scene to say something snarky,” Kyle Buchanan writes. “She is not present for most of the movie’s major scenes or action set pieces, has no bearing on the plot, and disappears for wide swaths of the film. Spider-Man never saves her, and Peter Parker never kisses her: In fact, he barely seems to know she exists.”
While Zendaya’s zingers promise to be worth a laugh and she brings some healthy wokeness to the movie, the real female lead is Laura Harrier. She plays a character named Liz who Spider-Man is trying to catch in his web.
Despite the news, Zendaya did get a chance to flex her acting muscles on a Spider-Man project. Vanity Fair had her perform a dramatic reading of the original theme song from the 1960s web-slinger cartoon.
Watch her do her best to bring it to life below.
(Photo credit: Zendaya Instagram account)
