Viral Hand-Drawn ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ Theater Poster Removed by Head Office Now Creator Plans to Sell Copies

Sometimes, the most buzzworthy art associated with a blockbuster isn’t the official marketing. This was true for a small Canadian theater this month, where a hand-drawn placeholder generated more excitement than the studio-approved posters.

The story began at a Famous Players 6 in Prince George, British Columbia, where staff found themselves without any official promotional materials for the summer’s biggest release. To avoid an empty display case, one employee took the initiative.

Nineteen-year-old Drake Landon, the theater’s resident artist, was tasked by his manager to create a mock-up poster to fill the void left by the missing ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ materials. What he produced instead became a viral sensation, garnering both fan admiration and corporate backlash.

Landon’s manager specifically requested he draw Spooder-Man, the crudely rendered, MS Paint-style Spider-Man meme that gained popularity online around 2012, rather than a traditional depiction of the character. Although Landon initially considered drawing the real Spider-Man, he ultimately embraced the joke and crafted a hand-drawn version of Spooder-Man inspired by the film’s Brand New Day redesign.

Beneath the illustration, Landon included a handwritten note that read, “Sorry! We never received the real posters! Sorry for any inconveniences!” The misspellings only added to its charm, and when a moviegoer photographed Landon next to his creation and shared it in local Facebook groups, the viral chain reaction began.

The image quickly spread across Reddit, including the Marvel Studios subreddit, where it received tens of thousands of upvotes and was widely shared across entertainment and movie news platforms. Landon told CBC News that he aimed to stay true to the character’s newer Brand New Day design while capturing the meme’s signature crude style.

So, the spooder man poster needed to be taken down…sadly.
by u/Single_Storm9743 in marvelstudios

The poster’s popularity even reached Cineplex’s corporate offices, where Michelle Saba, the company’s VP of communications, praised the effort. Saba mentioned that the team simply had a little fun while waiting for their official ‘Spider-Man: Brand New Day’ poster to arrive, a sentiment she shared with The Hollywood Reporter.

However, that goodwill did not prevent the poster from being removed from display. Landon explained that his manager informed him, “head office called and asked for it to be taken down,” reportedly to avoid any issues with the studio regarding unofficial use of the character and film branding.

Initially, Landon chose to remain anonymous online out of concern he might be accused of fabricating the story. However, he eventually came forward on Reddit to confirm he was the artist behind the drawing. He has since expressed his intention to create and print a limited run of copies or redrawn duplicates for fans eager to purchase their own version.

For a movie that is already breaking box office records as the longest Spider-Man film ever made, it’s a fittingly quirky footnote that a marker sketch meant for a single shift ended up overshadowing the professional marketing campaign, at least in one corner of the internet. Landon has mentioned that he generally prefers drawing robots and machines in his free time, making this unexpected brush with viral fame somewhat of a surprise.

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