Shailene Woodley says she filmed three scenes as Mary Jane Watson for The Amazing Spider-Man 2 before being told about a year later that she was no longer in the movie. The cut turned a cast change into a small franchise case study: a major character was shot, then removed, and the release plan shifted around Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield.
Woodley’s three scenes
Woodley said she and Andrew Garfield filmed three scenes together after she was cast as Mary Jane for Spider-Man, a role she called her dream. She also said, “My god, Spider-Man's my favorite superhero, Mary Jane was my favorite character growing up.” That line explains why the removal landed as more than a routine edit; it was a part she wanted badly enough to remember the call that took it away.
She said the call came later with a blunt answer: “Oh, we shot it. That was a fun phone call.” When she was told she was out, her reaction was, “What? What do you mean?” That sequence matters because it shows the role was not a rumor or a passing idea. It was filmed, then removed after the production had already moved through the shoot.
Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield
Woodley said the filmmakers told her they had introduced a lot of new characters and were going to wait for whatever happened between Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield. She said they added, “Let’s wait for her to die, and then we’ll introduce Mary Jane.” In practical terms, that meant Mary Jane Watson was being held back as part of a character rollout rather than being treated as a standard supporting role.
She also said the film that would have reintroduced Mary Jane was never made. That leaves her cut scenes in a strange middle ground: real footage, but no released appearance in The Amazing Spider-Man 2. For viewers tracking franchise continuity, the important point is not just that Woodley was dropped; it is that the plan depended on another film that never arrived.
What Woodley still says
Woodley did not lock the reason to a single explanation. “That’s what I was told, but again, who knows what the truth is? I could have been terrible, and they were like, ‘We can’t do this,’” she said. That gives the story a useful complication: the cut may have reflected franchise timing, performance concerns, or both, and Woodley herself leaves room for either.
For readers following Spider-Man casting across the MCU era, the main takeaway is simple. Woodley’s Mary Jane was not just imagined, she was shot in 2014, then removed about a year later, and the version that would have paid it off never happened. Andrew Garfield later appeared in Spider-Man: No Way Home with Tom Holland and Tobey Maguire, while Avengers: Doomsday is set for Dec. 18. For Woodley, the old cut still defines one of the franchise’s clearest what-if cast moves.
