Spider-Man: Brand New Day is the final Marvel film scheduled before Avengers: Doomsday arrives on December 18. That makes Peter Parker’s latest crisis particularly important, with the consequences of his choices potentially carrying into the next confrontation with Doctor Doom.
Peter has already caused enormous disruption. In Spider-Man: No Way Home, his attempt to make the world forget his secret identity, with help from Doctor Strange, fractured the multiverse. His newest solution is less reality-breaking, but it may still create a serious threat for the wider Marvel universe.
Warning: this article contains spoilers for Spider-Man: Brand New Day.
Peter Parker creates a dangerous solution
In Brand New Day, Peter experiences a form of spider puberty. His arachnid hormones become unbalanced, intensifying his senses and causing him to develop spinnerets similar to those used by Tobey Maguire’s Spider-Man in Sam Raimi’s trilogy.
Peter turns to Bruce Banner, played by Mark Ruffalo, for assistance. Banner has begun wearing an inhibitor to prevent himself from transforming into the Hulk, giving Peter the basis for a device designed to suppress mutated DNA. The technology can affect mutations caused by gamma radiation, a radioactive spider bite or the X-gene.
Peter uses one inhibitor on himself to restrain his emerging abilities. A second device is used against the telepathic mutant Jean Grey, played by Sadie Sink. The equipment eventually ends up with the United States Department of Damage Control.
Damage Control may be building its own Sentinels
Damage Control keeps Jean subdued while scanning her brain. Its aim is to understand how her telepathic powers work and potentially transfer that capability to another person. The organisation also studies Jean’s sister, Sara, giving it access to more information about mutant abilities.
This plot has an obvious connection to the Sentinels shown under Doctor Doom’s command in the Avengers: Doomsday trailer. The robots are associated with suppressing mutant powers and reproducing mutant abilities. They may have crossed over from another reality, particularly because Sentinels were central to X-Men: Days of Future Past and several characters from Bryan Singer’s 2014 film have been confirmed to return in Doomsday.
However, the films may instead reveal that Damage Control developed its own version. Peter’s inhibitor technology, combined with the data collected from Jean and Sara, could give the organisation the foundation for creating anti-mutant machines.
Fear could turn Peter’s invention against the X-Men
Sentinels are traditionally created by frightened humans who want protection from mutants. Their defining flaw is that the intelligent machines eventually turn against the people who built them.
Damage Control has plenty of motivation to fear mutants after Jean unleashed the Hulk inside its facility and nearly killed the organisation’s leader. MJ also recognises the disturbing purpose of Peter’s invention when she describes the suppression device as something intended for a monster.
The inhibitor may be useful to Bruce Banner, but Peter did not truly need it. Once he accepted his new mutations, he became stronger. His fear of those changes may therefore have produced a weapon with consequences far beyond his own story—particularly for the X-Men, who are due to receive their own film in 2028.
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