Disney and Sony’s latest entry into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Brand New Day, came very close to earning a whopping $1 billion at the box office in its opening weekend—and that was yesterday’s news, so there’s a very high chance it’s crossed the billion-dollar mark by now.
So, what could have helped the new MCU flick rake in these kinds of numbers so quickly? Do people truly just love Spider-Man that much? Or did Tom Holland and Jon Bernthal appearing on Hot Ones push it over the edge? Or, just maybe, is it the ads for Spider-Man: Brand New Day that have been popping up on BMW owners’ dashboards?
As spotted by The Autopian (via Techspot), BMW owners are being offered a “surprise!” in the form of a new Spider-Man: Brand New Day commercial in their cars, and, quite understandably, the folks over on the r/BMW subreddit aren’t very happy that they’re getting hit by advertisement pop-ups in their $60,000 cars.
The icing on the cake here is that BMW Group’s Senior VP, Stephan Durach, previously stated in late 2023 that the company definitely would never put ads in its cars: “To say I’m selling the screen to play a commercial—I don’t see it. It’s a private space.”
BMW OWNERS DIDN’T PAY SIX FIGURES TO WATCH ADS.
BMW owners are criticizing the automaker after a full-screen Spider-Man: Brand New Day ad reportedly appeared on dashboard displays. The promotion is tied to BMW’s marketing partnership with the upcoming film. pic.twitter.com/H8JSCrgpUb
— CEO of CEO’s (@4evaflyA) August 4, 2026
As far as I can tell, these ads come in two forms: one is a pop-up that will display the message “Surprise! Spider-Man just dropped into your BMW!” and the other is a Spider-Man: Brand New Day icon that will sit in the menu settings on the BMW dashboard. Clicking either will launch a commercial that takes up the entire dashboard. In the one you can see above, Spidey swings down a city street, trailing a new BMW.
And this is just theorizing on my behalf, but does anything look a little off about this advert to anyone else? The architecture of some of the buildings just doesn’t make sense. Weird, unnecessary ledges, windows that don’t line up, and a New York skyline that only kind of looks like the NYC skyline.
Well, whatever the reason for the commercial’s odd stylistic choices may be, Kotaku has reached out to BMW Group for an official comment, as well as to discern the scope of its in-car Spider-Man: Brand New Day advertising campaign, but did not receive a reply before publishing.
Update 8/4/2026, 11:15 a.m. ET: A spokesperson for BMW told Kotaku the Spider-Man animations are “not a form of advertising”
“The Festive App in the BMW operating system is designed to provide customers with optional themed animations and messages linked to a range of global and local occasions,” they wrote in an email. “It is not a form of advertising. Customers receive a pop-up message in the vehicle and can choose whether or not to launch the animation. The animation can only be viewed when the vehicle is stationary. In addition, it can be accessed manually via the Festive App menu icon if the customer chooses to open it.”
