Tom Holland’s Marvel Fame Is Much More ‘Intense’ Than Star Wars, According To Daisy Ridley

One of this weekend’s big releases, Chaos Walking, sees the pairing of two of the biggest stars on the planet: Marvel’s Spider-Man, Tom Holland, and Star Wars’ Rey Skywalker, Daisy Ridley. The actors paused work on each of their respective franchises back in 2017 to make the movie adaptation of Patrick Ness’ bestselling book, The Knife of Never Letting Go. One might imagine shooting the sci-fi film in Vancouver, Canada was the perfect time for them to pause and make something outside of the expansive universes they’d come to be famous for.

When CinemaBlend spoke to Daisy Ridley for Chaos Walking, the 28-year-old actress told us something unexpected: she believes Holland’s job as Spider-Man is a lot bigger than her role as the main protagonist of the recent Star Wars trilogy. Check out what she told us:

I genuinely think Tom Holland has a way different time than me. I was part of a group of wonderful people and I always felt part of a group and Star Wars is its own thing. It has a life of its own and I was always with John and Oscar and Adam – it was always like a group thing. But Tom plays Spider-Man in Spider-Man. It’s like mega. I know I had a mega opportunity and it’s amazing, but in terms of that, it’s so different. He is literally the face of Spider-Man, which I’m like ‘that is intense!’ But he deals with it very well. Very well. And he gets approached and everything, a lot and he’s great and so gracious.

Daisy… you are literally the face of Star Wars though. To her point, she felt like she got to come up with a group of other actors all at once in terms of her Star Wars fame. Daisy Ridley had John Boyega at her side, both of whom were relatively unknown before starring in The Force Awakens, and was also paired with Oscar Isaac and Adam Driver. Whereas when Tom Holland became Spider-Man, he wasn’t really part of a group of other names coming up at the same time with the same status in the Marvel franchise. Sure, there’s Zendaya and Jacob Batalon to complete the trio, but when Spider-Man was first introduced in Captain America: Civil War, eyes were most certainly all on him.

While I understand her the reasoning, it does seem like Daisy Ridley was given something really massive, and perhaps even more insane than Tom Holland’s swing into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. For years, she was Rey Kenobi, or Rey “No One, and finally Rey Palpatine and Rey Skywalker. Her character continued the legacy of one of the most beloved franchises of all time, and a movie series that seriously changed film history. She got to work alongside Mark Hamill’s Luke Skywalker and Harrison Ford’s Han Solo. Does it get any bigger than that?

Of course, if she had Tom Holland with her to speak about this Marvel vs. Star Wars, debate he’d likely humble himself too. Either way, it’s super interesting how Daisy Ridley looks at her own career in comparison to the 24-year-old Spidey actor. She clearly got a firsthand look at what his life is like when they shot Chaos Walking together.

Chaos Walking arrives in select theaters this Friday, March 5. What do you think? Who has the bigger role in the framework of Hollywood, Daisy Ridley or Tom Holland? Vote in our poll below.

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Up next: 'Chaos Walking' Interview With Daisy Ridley

Sarah El-Mahmoud
Staff Writer

Sarah El-Mahmoud has been with CinemaBlend since 2018 after graduating from Cal State Fullerton with a degree in Journalism. In college, she was the Managing Editor of the award-winning college paper, The Daily Titan, where she specialized in writing/editing long-form features, profiles and arts & entertainment coverage, including her first run-in with movie reporting, with a phone interview with Guillermo del Toro for Best Picture winner, The Shape of Water. Now she's into covering YA television and movies, and plenty of horror. Word webslinger. All her writing should be read in Sarah Connor’s Terminator 2 voice over.