Fans were curious how ‘Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse’ would handle the character Ganke Lee. In the comics, Ganke is Miles Morales’ roommate and best friend, and a superhero super fan who enthusiastically champions Miles’ role as he new Spider-Man.
Ganke is such a popular character that… well, they kind of ripped him off for the live action movie ‘Spider-Man: Homecoming’. Jacob Batalon‘s character might technically be named Ned Leeds, but readers know that his character is essentially that of Ganke, the “guy in the chair.”
But ‘Homecoming’ features Tom Holland as Peter Parker, the classic Web Head. ‘Into the Spider-Verse’ is actually about Miles. How would producers handle Ganke without making him look like a knock-off of Ned to the uninitiated? Well, as it turns out, they simply didn’t use Ganke very much. But that wasn’t always the plan.
Production designer Justin K. Thompson described him saying “He is one of the most gifted students at the Academy. We see him stay up all night working on his quantum entanglement thesis. He’s so single-mindedly focused that he seems completely oblivious to anything his roommate might be up to.”
In the book, ‘Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse -The Art of the Movie’ the storyboards for a deleted scene reveal that Ganke originally had a much larger role in the film, even accompanying Peter and Miles when they went to infiltrate Alchemax. Check it out below:
It’s really not clear what role he would have played. ‘Into the Spider-Verse’ was already packed with characters, so Ganke may have just gotten in the way, so it may be best that he was cut down to a minor role.
Ganke has several pages in the book dedicated to him, so it shows that there were bigger plans for him. Reportedly, Ganke will have a larger role in the sequel to ‘Into the Spider-Verse’ which Sony greenlit before the first movie even hit theaters. Would you like to see how Ganke is utilized in the animated film universe?
‘Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse’ is playing in theaters now.
Source: ComicBook.com