The Classic Amazing Spider-Man Reference You Missed In Spider-Man: No Way Home

Spoilers ahead for "Spider-Man: No Way Home"

The dark corners of the internet weren't without their rumors and whispers, and now that the movie is out, the spider is well and truly out of the bag: Apart from the multiple villains from different Spider-movies of yesteryear, "Spider-Man: No Way Home" also features three different Peter Parkers. Apart from the Marvel Cinematic Universe version played by Tom Holland, you see the reemergence of Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield's Spider-Men, and all the spider-to-spider banter, one-liners, and difficult heart-to-hearts this entails.

As the trio of Spider-Men prepares to face off against their enemies, the viewers are treated to awkward and glorious conversations ranging from the subjects of organic webbing and back problems to self-esteem issues and coping with traumatic losses. Many of these interactions take place during the lulls between action scenes and reveal the personality and inner struggles of each Peter. 

However, "No Way Home" leaves one of its deepest Spider-Man cuts deliberately somewhat unexplained, and if you're not familiar with the source material, you might barely register it. Let's take a look at the classic "Amazing Spider-Man" reference you missed in "Spider-Man: No Way Home."

As "Spider-Man: No Way Home" makes abundantly clear, every Spider-Man seems destined to experience heartbreaking losses of their loved ones. As Tom Holland's version learns to his absolute horror in the movie, it pretty much goes with the territory. However, "No Way Home" does offer one particular Spider-Man a modicum of redemption, and the moment is certainly not lost on the character.

As Andrew Garfield's Spidey briefly mentions in the movie, his most crushing loss comes in "The Amazing Spider-Man 2," as he narrowly fails to save the life of a falling Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone). In "No Way Home," however, he leaps at the chance of successfully saving MJ (Zendaya) from a similar certain death fall, after the Holland Spidey is temporarily taken out of the picture. 

Though the moment is not really elaborated upon, it's clear that Garfield's Spider-Man is more shaken by the successful save than MJ was by the fall, to the point that MJ ends up asking the visibly emotional man whether he's all right. He is, of course. By saving MJ, the Amazing Spider-Man finally gets a low-key redemption for the failure that has clearly been haunting him for years. No wonder the guy loses it for a few seconds.