The fate of Tom Holland‘s Spider-Man is one of the biggest questions hanging over the MCU right now, one which potentially has the power to determine the future success of the franchise overall. Spider-Man: No Way Home remains the only Marvel film since Avengers: Endgame to cross the coveted $1 billion marker at the box office, although Deadpool & Wolverine has a healthy chance at matching it this summer. Nevertheless, losing Holland could well be the MCU’s biggest glow since Downey, Evans, and Johansson said sayonara.

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Webheads the world over are desperately waiting on confirmation that the 27-year-old has agreed to don the red and blue spandex at least one more time for Spider-Man 4. Unfortunately, Holland himself has remained incredibly cagey on the possibility for the longest time now. His last major comment on the situation came last December, when he specified that he’d only do another one if everyone could agree on a strong enough story. This was in sharp contrast to the days when he used to say he wanted to keep playing Peter Parker for decades.

Has Tom Holland signed up for half a dozen more Marvel movies?

Nevertheless, although it’s not like Mr. Zendaya himself has revealed the news, a new rumor going around is worth sharing, if only to give Holland fanatics a small ray of hope. According to the latest scuttlebutt, Holland secretly signed up for a total of SIX further projects in 2023, across which will play out a fresh arc for the webslinger before he ultimately swings off into the New York sunset. These alleged projects are an entire second Spider-Man trilogy, two more Avengers films (presumably The Kang Dynasty and Secret Wars), and one mystery movie. The Fantastic Four? We can dream.

On the face of it, this might seem like a surprising amount of commitment for an actor who’s apparently on the fence about returning, but it would make sense to either go all in or all out. Sony and Marvel aren’t interested in simply making Spider-Man 4, after all — they will undoubtedly want to start a new trilogy. So either Holland has to stay around for the long haul or bow out now. If he does agree to stick around for half a dozen more projects, there’s a very strong chance he could be pushing 40 by the time he finally leaves his Marvel home behind.

The truth is that only Marvel, Sony, and Holland know what the actual plan is. As for the rest of us mere mortals, the likelihood is that some kind of announcement will be made at San Diego Comic-Con this summer. Until then, all we can do is bear in mind that Tom Holland has Hollywood at his feet so this critical junction in his career might just be the biggest decision of his life. With great star-power comes great responsibility.