'Spider-Man: No Way Home' trailer drops, sparking fan frenzy

The first teaser trailer for "Spider-Man: No Way Home" went online Monday night, and by 3 p.m. Tuesday had garnered more than 31 million views at Sony Pictures Entertainment's YouTube channel and 39 million at its Twitter account. Following the leak of a quickly quashed alleged trailer Sunday, the release of an official one that confirmed some rumors about the film has stirred a fan frenzy. "Spider-Man: No Way Home," directed by Jon Watts, is scheduled for theatrical release Dec. 17.

Star Tom Holland, whose Instagram account also posted the trailer, reacted Tuesday with a selfie video on Instagram Stories, where posts cycle out after a day. "I'm at the airport, I've been flying for the last 10 hours, so I actually didn't post the trailer — my brother Harry did," the 25-year-old English actor said, adding, "I've turned my phone on and my phone has gone mental. The love and support you guys are showing for the film is so exciting. Honestly, that is just the tip of the iceberg," he said of the trailer's revelations. "You have no idea what else is to come."

The trailer opens quietly with Peter Parker (Holland) and his girlfriend MJ (Zendaya) relaxing on a rooftop as she reads a tabloid newspaper making bizarre claims about Spider-Man, whose identity became publicly known at the end of "Spider-Man: Far from Home" (2019), the second film in the current series.

The mood quickly shifts as we see Peter chained to an interrogation-room desk at a police station. He tells detectives, "Listen, I did not kill Mysterio," the master-of-illusions supervillain who died in his own backfired trap in the previous film. "The [armed] drones did."

"The drones that are yours?" a detective asks sharply of the weapons system bequeathed to Peter by the late Tony Stark/Iron Man.

Hounded by paparazzi and protesters, Peter worries about the consequences for his Aunt May (Marisa Tomei), his friend Ned (Jacob Batalon) and others. He beseeches the sorcerer Dr. Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) to make the world forget Peter is Spider-Man.

Strange agrees to help, against the advice of his factotum, Wong (Benedict Wong). But Peter unthinkingly enters the enchantment area, disrupting Strange's spell — and tearing a hole in the multiverse, the alternate realities explored through the multiple Spider-Man characters in the animated feature "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse" (2019).

The trailer concludes with an attack on the Henry Hudson Parkway near the George Washington Bridge, with a de-aged Alfred Molina reprising his role as antagonist Dr. Octopus from "Spider-Man 2" (2004). One of the Green Goblin's grenade-like bombs explodes — as what sounds like the voice of Willem Dafoe as that supervillain from the 2002 "Spider-Man" intones, "Be careful what you wish for, Parker."