'It took the time that it took': Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man producers explain why it's taken so long for the Marvel TV show to be released on Disney Plus

• Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man's producers have revealed why its release was delayed
• The Marvel show's launch wasn't impacted by the pandemic or 2023 Hollywood strikes
• Work was completed in mid-2024, so we've had to wait seven months for it

Two of Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man's (YFNSM) producers have explained why it wasn't released sooner than it should've been.

Brad Winderbaum and Jeff Trammell, the latter of whom is also YFNSM's showrunner and head writer, told TechRadar that there were two big reasons for the show's delayed launch. Strangely, it had nothing to do with the pandemic or the 2023 Hollywood strikes, even though the latter was the chief cause for multiple Marvel movie delays and a much quieter 2024 for Marvel Studios on the Disney Plus front.

So, considering Winderbaum – Marvel's head of TV, streaming, and animation – told me that the Marvel Phase 5 show was "completed last summer" (that'll be mid-2024, for anyone wondering), what was the hold up? As it happens, adding some final polish to the overall series and, even more curiously, issues from a distribution perspective.

"We announced it pretty quickly after we greenlit its development," Winderbaum told me about Spider-Man's latest animated adventure. "We started showing fans some of the art at Comic-Con [in July 2021], so we were working on it right around then.

"The development timeline was around three years and we actually completed it last summer," he added. "So, we've been waiting with bated breath for the world to see it. The only real delay was on the distribution side. You know, release schedules and subject to a lot of different forces in the world, so they're liable to shift and change."

It wasn't just the scheduling patterns that deviated from their original target. YFNSM was initially designed to be a show that was canon in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), one that would've acted as a prequel to the Tom Holland-starring Spider-Man movies that are also set in Marvel's cinematic juggernaut. However, as Winderbaum explained on a December 2024 edition of the Phase Hero Podcast, the comic book giant pivoted away from that plan when, as Windderbaum put it, "we would've had to put so many limiters on our story to get it to lock into canon".

Even with its semi-creative overhaul, YFNSM was ready to make its debut on one of the world's best streaming services seven months ago. Given the dearth of Marvel content last year, it would've made sense to release it on Disney's primary streamer in 2024, then. Regardless, Trammell isn't complaining about the additional development time that was afforded to the show's crew.

"It took the time that it took," he told me with a smile. "There were certain parts of it where we thought 'we can push this even further and make it better', and we were allowed the time to do that by Marvel, which was great.

"Everyone wants to deliver the best version possible," Trammell continued, "And I think we were able to do that because Marvel was so supportive, and gave us more time to iron things out or work on something that wasn't at the required level. It's great to have the chance to do that because I've worked on other shows where that wasn't the case and we were forced to hit specific deadlines. Marvel knew this was an important series, so they wanted us to get it right."

Depending on who you ask, YFNSM could've used more time to make it as good as possible. Indeed, Trammell has already had to defend its animation style after some fans criticised how it looked, so some people may not agree with his sentiments. Anyway, you can see what I thought of YFNSM and whether it deserves a spot in our best Disney Plus shows guide, when my review goes live tomorrow (January 29).

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