Marvel seems to acknowledge it can’t rival the timeless appeal of ancient Greek epics, as Spider-Man 4 faces a delay, likely to clear the stage for Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of The Odyssey.

Spider-Man 4 has had its release date shifted slightly by Marvel, and it’s almost definitely thanks to Christopher Nolan.

The next MCU Spidey film is still shrouded in a lot of mystery, especially considering it wasn’t particularly clear whether or not it would even happen, but there are two things we know about it: Destin Daniel Cretton is directing it, and it’s coming out in July 2026. That second one is still true, but Sony has now apparently shifted the film’s release date by an entire week from July 24, 2026, to July 31, 2026. The reason for the change? Well, no specific reason was given, but you can almost guarantee that it’s in part due to the fact that Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of The Odyssey was coming out just a week prior on July 17, 2026, so this release date change puts a couple of weeks of distance between them.

It’s almost definitely a wise decision on Sony’s part, Spider-Man 4 is obviously guaranteed to do some big box office numbers given the popularity of the character, but Nolan’s Odyssey will likely do incredibly well too seeing how easily he can bring people out to the cinema even for historical dramas like Oppenheimer. Not only that, but Spider-Man himself Tom Holland is also starring in The Odyssey, making it a very busy July for the actor. I mean, it’ll be mostly busy in terms of having to make appearances across two likely to be full-on press junkets for what’ll be two of the biggest films of the year, but you get what I mean.

There is the chance we’ll be seeing Holland as Spider-Man a little sooner than July 2026, as there have been rumours floating around that the character will be back for Avengers: Doomsday, which is set to be released a couple of months prior on May 1, 2026. That film is set to shoot later this year, but this will be the real test to see if people care about the Avengers as a whole.