It looks like Peter Parker will make his Marvel Cinematic Universe debut in a year from now, when "Captain America: Civil War" swings into theaters. But if Joss Whedon had had it his way, your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man would be in theaters right now.

Appearing on the Empire podcast, Whedon reveals that he wanted to feature Spidey as part of the new Avengers lineup at the end of "Avengers: Age of Ultron," but pesky rights issues got in the way of his plans. Whedon says he wanted both Parker and Carol "Captain Marvel" Danvers in that final scene, "but neither of the deals were made" at the time. It was only after the film was locked that Marvel finally got their hands on the radioactive spider-dude, so it was way too late for Whedon to make his (and our) dreams come true.

Not that we're losing sleep over missing out on Spider-Man in "Age of Ultron." For one thing, this movie is absolutely PACKED. It would be no easy feat to fit Spidey into an already stuffed movie. For another thing, we don't have to wait long at all for our Peter Parker fix, with "Civil War" very much on the horizon, and his own feature film one year after that.

Here's what we ARE bummed about: Whedon's Spider-Man never coming to pass. The two-time "Avengers" writer-director seems like he's done with Marvel, at least for now, making it likely that we won't see him tackling the new "Spider-Man" movie. That's a huge downer, because we can already picture Whedon's Spider-Man movie on our heads…

Witty dialogue for days on end.

High school drama taken to a whole new level.

A J. Jonah Jameson to rival J.K. Simmons…

…played by Nathan Fillion?

How's that for casting against type?

Heartbreaking deaths that will make you cry forever.

There's no saving Uncle Ben, and Aunt May would probably bite it too, just for good measure.

Song and dance numbers…

…that'll put "Spider-Man 3" to shame.

That's just scratching the surface. The point is, we missed out on some serious Spider-Man awesomeness, with Whedon not fitting the character into "Avengers," even if only for a second, and walking away from Marvel before he gets the chance to make his very own Spidey flick.

Is it too late? Let's hope not. If nothing else, we really hope Whedon can at least have a hand in writing the new "Spider-Man" script, because his spidey-sensibilities are straight up on point. Rumors have it that the new "Spider-Man" will come from Whedon's friend and frequent collaborator Drew Goddard of "Cabin in the Woods," so it's easy to see how Whedon could get tangled up in the MCU Spidey's web. Universe, make it so!