Spider-Noir Timeline Explained: Where It Lands in Marvel and What It Means for the Spider-Verse

Prime Video and MGM have a new Spider- Man show that is happily left of center. It is called Spider-Noir, it leans into the weirder corners of the Spider-Verse, and it stars Nicolas Cage as a very not-great-at-life superhero. If you are wondering when this thing takes place and whether it connects to the animated Spider-Verse movies where Cage already voiced Spider-Man Noir, you are not alone. Let’s break it down.

The setup

It is an 8-episode series built around Cage as Ben Reilly — also referred to as The Spider, Spider-Man Noir, and sometimes just Spider-Noir. This version is a washed-up, retired vigilante with a drinking problem and a complicated relationship with heroism. The show has been getting solid early buzz, including at least one 4-star review out there.

When it is set (and why that matters)

Spider-Noir takes place 15 years after World War I, which puts it in 1932. That is very early in Marvel chronology. If you tried to drop it onto the MCU ’s so-called Sacred Timeline, it would land before Captain America: The First Avenger and Agent Carter. Only some flashback chunks of Eternals and parts of Eyes of Wakanda go earlier than WWI — which underlines how far back this show is playing.

The post-WWI setting is not just window dressing. Two key antagonists — Lonnie Lincoln (played by Abraham Popoola) and Flint Marko (played by Jack Huston) — are veterans of that war, and the fallout from their service is important to the story. In the comics, the Peter Parker version of Spider-Man Noir wore a look influenced by Uncle Ben’s pilot uniform from the conflict. Here, Ben Reilly himself is a veteran, which helps explain his more militaristic edge alongside the classic trenchcoat-and-fedora noir vibe.

But didn’t Nic Cage already play Spider-Man Noir?

Yes, in the animated Into the Spider-Verse — and Cage is expected to be back for the sequel. No, this is not that same guy. Spider-Noir’s Ben Reilly is a different character from the animated Spider-Man Noir you know. The show even gives an in-story reason for the different naming and identity details, so the continuity headaches are addressed on-screen.

How it does (and does not) connect to everything else

• Animated Spider-Verse: Separate universe. This series is not tied to the cartoon continuity, even though the lead actor is the same. In theory, that leaves the door open for two different Nic Cage Spider-Noirs to meet someday, if Sony ever wants to get wild.
• Other Sony live-action universes (Raimi trilogy, Amazing Spider-Man, etc.): Unclear. Because Spider-Noir is set decades earlier, it could coexist with those timelines without contradiction, but the show does not confirm any direct link.
• MCU and the bigger multiverse: Marvel’s recent multiverse storytelling already makes room for parallel worlds to sit side by side (those cheeky Venom tags did not exactly hide it). Treat Spider-Noir as another branch on that tree — adjacent, but not crossing over here.

The bottom line

Spider-Noir is a 1932-set, hardboiled spin on Spider-Man that treats WWI fallout as character fuel and lets Nicolas Cage play a battered, morally frayed Ben Reilly. It lives off to the side of the timelines you know, on purpose. If that sounds slightly confusing, the show does the work to explain who this guy is and why he is not the animated version — and that oddity might be its biggest selling point.