Spider-Man spinoffs still on without Marvel's help

With the news of the agreement between Sony and Marvel regarding Spider-Man, there were some questions regarding the upcoming spinoff films Sony already has given the green light to. We learned today that Sinister Six and Venom are indeed still moving forward and they will not require the assistance of Marvel and Kevin Feige.

There is no confirmation on whether Alex Kurtzman and Drew Goddard are still attached to their respective films, but the fact that Sony managed to hang out to these projects is pretty surprising. With that said, I would assume that Kurtzman and Goddard are going to stay in the picture. Without the involvement of Kevin Feige, who will co-produce the next solo Spidey film, Sony seems to want to try and prove once again that they can create a successful interconnected universe.
One thing to remember is now that Spider-Man can appear in Marvel films, that means Marvel characters can appear in the Sony films. This does open a possibility of introducing Marvel cameos into Venom and/or Sinister Six. Goddard does have some experience dealing with Marvel as he was originally attached to the Daredevil series set to premiere on Netflix, but he departed due to his commitments to Sinister Six. 

With the announced agreement between the studios last night it was also confirmed that previously announced Sony versions of The Amazing Spider-Man 3 and The Amazing Spider-Man 4 have been officially canceled. Sony had already delayed the projects by a year but with Marvel stepping in they have opted to restart with a new Spider-Man film in 2017. This all was kickstarted by the complete failure that was The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Many fans called for yet another reboot of the character with new villains and a new Peter Parker and it looks like they are getting their wish as Marvel is hoping to cast a younger actor to portray Spidey. Sorry, Andrew Garfield.

Female Spider-Man spinoff planned for 2017

Sony has been pretty full of surprises lately regarding the Spider-Man franchise. We are learning more about the Sinister Six along with learning that The Amazing Spider-Man 3 has been delayed until 2018. We now have information regarding a female Spider-Man spinoff reportedly planned for 2017.

This comes after much criticism of the superhero genre in general regarding the lack of female heroes. With the massive success of Guardians of the Galaxy this weekend, the fact that it is 44% female says a lot about the success of female based films. We also can cite films like Divergent, The Hunger Games, and Frozen.
Sony is still trying to do damage control after the ridiculous disappointing The Amazing Spider-Man 2 failed to make money at the box office. It has since become the lowest grossing Spider-Man film of all time. The last hope to save Sony's singular superhero franchise revamp a little bit with new heroes and... a woman.
Many are speculating that this spinoff will be centered around Black Cat (aka, Felicia Hardy). Hardy had a brief cameo in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, played by Felicity Jones, so she is the obvious choice to expand this franchise aside from the already planned Sinister Six and Venom movies. Other female possibilities could include Spider-Woman and Silver Sable.

I don't think this is by any means a stupid or bad move on Sony's part. If they have learned anything from what Marvel and Disney have done they should know by now that you can't carry a franchise based off of just one hero. If the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe was centered around Iron Man people would have abandoned it by now. They were smart and made separate movies for each character and found a way to tie them all together. If they put Peter Parker on the back burner for a while and focused on other characters for a bit I think it's possible for this franchise to have some revival and a renewed sense of interest.

The Amazing Spider-Man 3 pushed to 2017?

After a rather disappointing opening for The Amazing Spider-Man 2, it is a big possibility that we might have to wait an additional year to receive the third installment of the new franchise. Rumor has it that The Amazing Spider-Man 3 might be delayed until 2017.

Sony already has things locked down through The Amazing Spider-Man 4 as well as two spin-off films (aka, Sinister Six and Venom), but potentially delaying the third installment might indicate that the studio is rethinking their strategy. It currently holds a release date of June 10, 2016.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 opened this past May and was not only knocked out of the #1 spot after just one week, but it also recorded the lowest box office numbers of the entire franchise. Yes, that includes Sam Raimi's trilogy. The film is also expected to be surpassed by X-Men: Days of Future Past which would mark the first time in history that an X-Men film beat out Spider-Man.
The script for the third film is already completed, Marc Webb is set to return to the director's chair, and production was supposed to begin later this year. However, after the overwhelmingly negative reviews of TASM2 and underwhelming box office numbers we have not seen any signs pointing to a quick start for TASM3, thus making the rumored delay somewhat feasible.

Now... if this movie is delayed it will cause a ripple effect. With Sinister Six and Venom being pushed through rather quickly, it is possible that we might see the spin-offs before the third Spider-Man. It has already been said that Sony planned to cram Sinister Six in 2016 with TASM3 as a setup for TASM4 and Venom.
Seeing that the villains were one of the biggest complaints about TASM2 I won't be surprised if one or both of the spin-offs gets scrapped. Trying to revive a quickly dying franchise with an all villain installment might not be the best move at the current moment. Seriously, when people say the villains in Spider-Man 3 were better executed you know you have a major problem. With this it is also a possibility of TASM3 being limited to one villain instead of multiples.

Either way, I think we are bound to see some changes with this franchise. It's unfortunate seeing that The Amazing Spider-Man is only two years old.

Drew Goddard to direct The Sinister Six

It was spotted almost immediately after the trailers for The Amazing Spider-Man 2 hit, but we now have some official confirmation that The Sinister Six will indeed be moving forward and it will be directed by Drew Goddard.

Goddard got his start writing for Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Alias, as well as Lost and Angel, and made his directorial debut with The Cabin in the Woods back in 2012. Before that he wrote Cloverfield for Matt Reeves. He had already been hired to write Sinister Six, along with Marvel's Daredevil series to hit Netflix, so it is somewhat surprising to see him also picked to direct. But, at the same time it isn't that surprising.
The Sinister Six focuses on Spider-Man's villainous enemies. The comics focused on Electro, Doctor Octopus, Mysterio, Sandman, Vulture, and Kraven the Hunter. It does appear that The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is acting as more of a precursor to The Sinister Six rather than being a direct sequel to the first Amazing Spider-Man. Set to appear in the TASM2 are Electro, Green Goblin, and Rhino but there is no telling who else will be hinted at or show up. Also bear in mind that The Lizard was not killed in the first one, but was merely locked up.

There is no set timetable for The Sinister Six just yet, but Sony did announce plans to release a Spider-Man movie every year. Slots already taken are The Amazing Spider-Man 3 for 2016 and The Amazing Spider-Man 4 for 2018. It is possible we could see The Sinister Six for 2017 unless Venom takes that slot and they push Sinister Six for 2019 or double up 2018 with two releases.

Sony to release Spider-Man films every year; Marc Webb attached to TASM3

This is pretty hefty news.

In addition to the confirmation of director Marc Webb officially directing The Amazing Spider-Man 3, we have confirmation from Sony that they plan to have a Spider-Man release every year up until The Amazing Spider-Man 4 in 2018. This possibly includes, and is not limited to, a Venom spin-off and a Sinister Six movie.

All I have to say is these actors must have some seriously extended contracts to include this many movies. Either that or not every main character in the Amazing Spider-Man films will appear in these separate movies. It has already come out that Andrew Garfield might not extend his role as Peter Parker past his obligation of TASM4, so we will see what happens then. They might have to recast Peter at some point.
It is expected for this once a year schedule to begin in 2016 with the release of The Amazing Spider-Man 3 and my bet is we will see a Venom movie before a Sinister Six movie which means the main villain for TASM3 will most likely be Venom. Either that or he will be a minor to major part of it in order to introduce the character and give enough interest for a standalone film. Venom (aka, Eddie Brock) was previously butchered by Topher Grace in Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 3.

Some people are suggesting that this is a very dangerous move for Sony because it could overload viewers on Spider-Man. It's unlike the Marvel universe Disney has going on with the fact that they have multiple characters with different story arcs going on. With Spider-Man, it is generally one story arc with the same characters over and over again because it is the only character Sony has rights to. Unless the studios want to compromise and pay for it, that's how it will remain.


Either way, this will be interesting to see how this unfolds. I thought The Amazing Spider-Man was pretty bad and the sequel doesn't look much better so far. I'm not too excited for any of this. I think they will burn everyone out releasing a movie every year. 

Venom tied to The Amazing Spiderman?

New questions and information have arose for one of the most popular Marvel villains, Venom, in regards to the upcoming reboot The Amazing Spiderman. We have learned that it is possible for Venom to have a tie in to the film starring Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone.

Seeing that previous news has surfaced of Chronicle director Josh Trank taking the lead of a movie based solely on Venom people were wondering how you can have Venom without involving him with Spiderman at some point. At a recent press conference for The Amazing Spiderman, producer Matt Tolmach mentioned:

“I’m trying to say to you without giving anything away is hopefully all these worlds will live together in peace someday… look for the worlds to make sense with one another.”

Collider suggests that they are trying to follow an Avengers-like universe where you introduce the characters and then tie them all together into one movie later on. This idea works for different superheroes fighting one main villain, like in The Avengers, but I don't know if it will work with one movie about a villain (aka, Venom) and one movie about a superhero fighting a completely different villain (aka, Spiderman and The Lizard). Unless there is a third factor thrown in I don't see how it will work smoothly.

Venom spin-off in the works

Mind you this is very preliminary, but Columbia Pictures has tapped Chronicle director Josh Trank to direct a Spiderman spin-off featuring none other than Venom, aka Eddie Brock.

Now... I must say that Venom is one of my favorite comic book characters/villains of all time. Despite how much I would love to see this happen in some way I really don't want it to. There is practically no possible way to do a movie about Venom without Spiderman being present in some way.
With that said, maybe this is their way of saying that Venom will be the villain in the next Spiderman featuring Andrew Garfield? If there is another Spiderman with Garfield after The Amazing Spiderman, that is. We all know at this point the villain in The Amazing Spiderman is The Lizard, so maybe there will be a set up for Venom in a future film that will be centered more around the villain rather than Spiderman.

I know what you all are thinking; Spiderman 3 had Venom and it was terrible. Allow me to remind you that not only did Spiderman 3 suck in general but Eddie Brock was completely slaughtered in that movie. Venom shouldn't have even been included... I don't know. We'll just have to see how this plays out.

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