Dakota Johnson is in Talks to Star in Sony’s Spider-Verse Movie ‘Madame Web’

Dakota Johnson at the premiere of 'Fifty Shades of Grey'

Having won plenty of acclaim (and some awards nominations) for her role in Netflix’s ‘The Lost Daughter’, Dakota Johnson is looking to become a superhero in a future movie. She’s now in talks to star in Sony’s ‘Madame Web’.

The movie, which is part of the studio’s interconnected Marvel Spider-Man universe (not to be confused with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with which it links from time to time), has been in development for a while.

S.J. Clarkson, who has Marvel form with Netflix’s ‘The Defenders’ shows and has worked on shows including ‘Succession’ and ‘Made for Love’, is aiming to make her movie directorial debut. The script comes from Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless, the ‘Dracula Untold’ and ‘The Last Witch Hunter’ writers who have fellow Spider-adjacent movie ‘Morbius’ due in theaters on April 1.

Madame Web as a Marvel Comics character was created by writer Denny O’Neil and artist John Romita Jr., first appearing in The Amazing Spider-Man #210, which was published in November 1980.

Known as Cassandra Webb, she is usually depicted as an elderly blind woman suffering from a chronic neuromuscular disease that makes it difficult to move and breathe, and as such, she’s connected to a life support system that looks like a spider web. The clairvoyant character has precognitive abilities and once helped Spider-Man find a kidnap victim.

Tom Holland in 'Spider-Man: Homecoming'

She doesn’t sound like the basis for a compelling dynamic superhero movie… But wait! There’s more. As is so often the case with Marvel, there has been another version.

When Webb died, she passed her powers on to Julia Carpenter, who was the second incarnation of Spider-Woman and similarly became the second version of Madame Web. It's unclear which version the film will focus on, but given Johnson's age in relation to both characters, you figure she'll play Carpenter. Or both if they slap aging make-up on her initially.

Sony originally announced the movie back in 2019, and it has moved through the tricky development process more smoothly (aside from obvious pandemic delays) than some of the company’s other planned Spider-projects. Aside from the successful ‘Into the Spider-Verse’ movie, which has spun-off two sequels (the first, ‘Across the Spider-Verse Part One’ is due out October 7, the second in 2023) and both ‘Venom’ films, Sony has had mixed fortunes with its Marvel movies.

The Jared Leto-starring ‘Morbius’ has been delayed several times, while others, including ‘Silver and Black’ which was to have featured Silver Sable and Black Cat, are stuck at the script stage. Still, Sony has Olivia Wilde working on an untitled movie, and projects based on Kraven the Hunter and Silk still moving forward.

‘Madame Web’ doesn’t yet have a release date, but it does at least seem like it’ll shoot this year.

Though Sony had been looking at a long list of names, Johnson jumped to the head of the queue likely thanks to strong work in ‘Lost Daughter’ and other movies that have received praise at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, including ‘Cha Cha Real Smooth’ and ‘Am I OK?’. She will next be seen in Jane Austen adaptation ‘Persuasion’, which will be out this year.