Alfred Molina confirms return as Doc Ock in Spider-Man 3

Alfred Molina has confirmed reports that he's returning as Doctor Octopus for Tom Holland's Spider-Man 3.

In an interview with Variety, Molina also spilled a couple of details about reprising the role for Spider-Man 3, despite Marvel's instructions to say hush about it. "When we were shooting it, we were all under orders not to talk about it, because it was supposed to be some great big secret," Molina said. "But, you know, it's all over the internet. I actually described myself as the worst kept secret in Hollywood!"

Molina went on to give away a few minor spoilers, saying Spider-Man 3 reintroduces his Doc Ock in a continuation of his final scene from 2004's Spider-Man 2, where he neutralizes his reactor and drowns himself in the East River. When Molina asked how he survives the scene in Spider-Man 3, he was apparently told, "In this universe, no one really dies."

On the topic of continuity, the 67-year-old Molina says his age is a concern for him, despite seeing Marvel's de-aging of Robert Downey Jr. for Captain America: Civil War and Samuel Jackson for Captain Marvel. Molina explained that The Irishman's de-aging of Robert De Niro didn't always impress him.

"They made Robert De Niro's face younger, but when he was fighting, he looked like an older guy," Molina said. "He looked like an old guy! That's what worried me about doing it again ... I don't have the same physicality that I had 17 years ago," he continued. "That's just a fact."

Thankfully, Molina realizes that Doc Ock's famous tentacles will carry his performance. "I then remembered that it's the tentacles that do all the work!" 

"My basic physical move as Doc Ock, as the actor, is just this," he said, with Variety describing the actor's glaring eyes and menacing noises for context. "I just do that a lot, and the arms are doing all the killing and smashing and breaking."

Jamie Foxx is also said to be reprising his role from an earlier Spider-Man movie - that of Electro from 2014's The Amazing Spider-Man 2. J.K. Simmons has also said that he's already filmed another appearance as The Daily Bugle publisher J.J. Jameson after appearing in a post-credits sequence in Spider-Man: Far From Home. Finally, Foxx himself suggested in a since-deleted Instagram post that Spider-Man 3 could feature three different Spider-Men, which would almost certainly mean the return of Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield.

Despite Sony issuing a very soft denial of Maguire and Garfield's rumored return, a recent, now-deleted video from Sony's Latin American YouTube channel heavily implies that Tom Holland, Maguire, and Garfield all exist in a multiverse as different Peter Parkers, and that the three actors will come together in the upcoming threequel. That might sound crazy at first glance, but also consider that Spider-Man 3 is bringing in Benedict Cumberbatch's reality-bending Doctor Strange as a new mentor to Peter Parker, and it starts to make a lot of sense.

Here's how a new Spider-Man 3 filming location throws a Far From Home cliffhanger into question.