Eight years ago, Spider-Man: Homecoming introduced Michael Mando’s Mac Gargan, a gangster who tried to buy weapons from Michael Keaton’s Adrian Toomes before Spider-Man intervened. While we did see an alternate version of Gargan become The Scorpion in the Disney+ subscription-exclusive animated series Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man earlier this year, Mando’s version will finally make the turn to full supervillain next year in Spider-Man: Brand New Day. How that will happen remains to be revealed, but I suspect that another baddie from Homecoming will be responsible for The Scorpion’s emergence in the upcoming Marvel movie.
Remember Phineas Mason In Spider-Man: Homecoming?
Although the weaponry that Toomes and his gang sold in Spider-Man: Homecoming was derived from advanced technology left behind from the Avengers’ battles, Michael Chernus’ Phineas Mason was the person who turned that tech into the weapons. Without him, the Vulture suit and Shocker gauntlets wouldn’t have given Tom Holland’s Peter Parker so much trouble. And yet, at the end of Homecoming, it was unclear if Mason had been arrested by the police or managed to avoid capture.
In the comics, Phineas Mason is an older man who goes by The Tinkerer and was introduced in 1963’s The Amazing Spider-Man #2. His genius brain and engineering skills allow him to build strange weapons from average appliances and the most basic of components to either use himself or sell to other villains. He’s still primarily a thorn in Spider-Man’s side all these decades later, he’s also crossed paths with characters like The Punisher and Nick Fury.
Tinkerer Should Design Scorpion’s Suit In Spider-Man: Brand New Day
Otto Octavius created the Scorpion suit for Mac Gargan to use in Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, but I don’t think we’ll see this happen in Spider-Man: Brand New Day. For one thing, Doctor Octopus is a big enough villain that we surely would have heard about someone being cast to play him by now. Also, Alfred Molina reprised his take on Doc Ock in Spider-Man: No Way Home, and I doubt Marvel Studios would want two versions of the same villain to be used in back-to-back movies.
Tinkerer, however, has a low enough profile that he could easily be sneaked into Spider-Man: Brand New Day, or at least be unveiled for the movie later on. With Adrian Toomes having been transported to Sony’s Spider-Man Universe in Morbius, perhaps Gargan, who has either been freed from prison or escaped from it, manages to make contact instead with Mason, who’s avoided the authorities for all this time. Still desperate to exact revenge on Spider-Man, Gargan persuades Mason to help him, or maybe Mason doesn’t need much convincing if he’s already in full Tinkerer mode at this point. Either way, that’s how the Scorpion suit comes into play.
Obviously it’s possible that Scorpion’s suit could come from another source, but I’m hoping that Spider-Man: Brand New Day has brought Michael Chernus back to reprise Phineas Mason. Principal photography began at the beginning of August, and since filming on Severance Season 3 hasn’t started yet, maybe Chernus had room in his schedule to join the upcoming Spider-Man movie. We’ll find out one way or another when it comes out on July 31, 2026.
