SPIDER-MAN 2 from Marvel & Sony (7/5/19) 4 4

[justafan]

I always felt like the ending of Spider-Man Homecoming where PP, thinking it was a test, rejects Tony Stark's invitation to join the Avengers and to "go it on his own" was a metaphor and reference to Sony going forward without Disney/MCU.  In much the same way as PP/SM needed some guidance and grooming from Tony to realize his potential and be the hero he can be, I felt Disney did that for Sony.  I actually would have been fine with that back then.  Now that he's been in both IW and EG MCU movies it's sort of cemented him there. 

I know they could find easy ways to write SM and MCU universes out of each other and never have to make a solid reference back to each other, but having that history and emotion tied to it would just seem hollow and lose a lot of character validation.  I'd almost rather they just reboot him now and spare us the cringe-worthy efforts they'll slap together to try and make it work going forward in 1 or possibly 2 failed endeavors. 

I do think Sony has the potential to do a 3rd and 4th SM movie and can do so without the rest of the MCU.  Will it be as cool as seeing him tangle with the FF or a possible Punisher/DD cameo, or even reuinting with the new Avengers?  Probably not, but if carefully crafted they could develop a 2-movie saga + tie-in Sinister Six movie or even a Venom/Carnage movie.  However, managing 2-3 movies with that many characters is something that Disney made an art of.  There are many ways to screw it up but only 1 or 2 ways to do it right and without the creative control of the masterminds at Disney MCU, I'm afraid we'll just end up with another DOA plot ala SM3/Garfield ASM2.  And now with the universe seemingly constricted without all the MCU references, any future movies have to be really grand to compensate.  2-bit villains are not going to cut it when Spidey has already fought the likes of Thanos.

And in that vein, I know that many would love to see a Sinister Six movie but I'm actually against that.  On Spidey's best day, he couldn't beat all 6 at once alone.  Each plotline has some excuse for them fighting him one at a time or a discord among them causes their alliance to fall apart.  While seeing all those villains would be cool I just don't think Sony could pull it off successfully. I think they need to decide if they want to stage it for a 2-movie max franchise, or try to piece a 4-6 movie franchise that arcs over some of the best spidey plots/villains/moments.  I also think they have to carefully choose their villains.  I love Kraven the Hunter and Kraven's last hunt arc but his character wouldn't translate too well to film and would be a snoozefest.  I also like the Scorpion and Rhino but those guys are pretty one-dimensional and don't have enough depth to be the main plot villain.

Venom/Carnage would have be an excellent choice but they've already painted themselves into a corner with the Eddie Brock back story and no reference to SM.  However, if they're willing to they could bring Venom to NYC or SM to SF and have them meet and fight due to Venom being blamed for murders that are actually done by Carnage.  Then having them discover and fight Carnage.

GG has been overdone so many times it just tired.

Hobgoblin might be cool but tough to do w/o GG backstory and he might come off as too much of a GG ripoff without the backstory

Lizard could be done better.

Maybe Tombstone and Tarantula but they could be dull.

Doc Ock & Sand man are cool but would kinda be a step down from the threats he's faced.

The Jackal, maybe...in cahoots with Smythe and the spider-slayers...

But if they pulled together a Sinister Six with: Paste Pot Pete, Gibbon, Big Wheel, Kangaroo, Hammerhead, Grizzly, I'd be all in.  Actually that's mostly the Spider-Man Revenge squad minus the Spot.

 

 

[wiparker824]

1 hour ago, fantastic_four said:

One thing seems certain--Marvel's comics division WILL be giving Sony the cold shoulder.  Or maybe they've already been doing that for years?  I know that Marvel writers weren't allowed to create new mutant characters for years due to their film rights going automatically to Fox, so no new Spider-Man characters from now on, or from some previously-decided point in the past on.  I wonder how long Disney's executive team has recognized the mistake of giving Mile Morales away for free?  They won't be doing THAT again!  Have Axel Alonso or C.B. Cebulski already been prohibiting writers from creating new Spider-characters for a while?  

I know people love Spidey's rogues gallery--and so do I--but their quality is tied ENTIRELY to Spider-Man as a character.  We love them because we love Spider-Man.  Truly great villains like Galactus, Doctor Doom, or Magneto cross over into other titles, but which Spidey villains have successfully done that?  I can only think of one--the symbiote.  Besides Venom, which Spider-Man-related hero or villain has stood successfully on their own as anything other than a C-list character?  I can't think of any others, although a limited case can be made for Kingpin who became more of a Daredevil villain than he even now is for Spidey.  So I'm not sold on how large a universe Sony really has here.  Mysterio, Black Cat, or Kraven standalone spin-offs?  Umm, yea, good luck with that.  

I’m not sure why anyone thinks Marvel will treat Sony any differently than they did pre-Holland movies, all that’s happening is that they’re going back to the original agreement. Did they ban writers from creating Spider-man characters from 2002-2014? Sure didn’t seem like it. 

[fantastic_four]

38 minutes ago, wiparker824 said:

Did they ban writers from creating Spider-man characters from 2002-2014?

No, but they also didn't ban X-Men writers from creating new characters for most of that time frame either.  Presumably it was Bob Iger or one of his reports who had the idea of doing that at some point after they bought Marvel in 2009.  I believe they started doing it with Fox and X-Men in 2013, but at that time there were multiple negotiations conflicts between those two companies in the press that weren't happening with Sony who they soon after signed the agreement to produce Spider-Man films for in February 2015.  Marvel was definitely still actively creating Spider-characters in 2014 since that's when the Spider-Verse series came out that eventually landed Sony a fantastic win last year, so if there have been any restrictions on writers it would have been in 2015 or later.

Edited August 22, 2019 by fantastic_four

[@therealsilvermane]

[theCapraAegagrus]

"The hardest choices require the strongest wills."

[fantastic_four]

9 minutes ago, @therealsilvermane said:

I'm seeing a trend of fans blaming Sony for this.  Which is bizarre since this was ENTIRELY because of Disney demanding more money.  And not just a little, a LOT more money.  Perhaps an unreasonably lot more...I haven't decided yet, I don't know the financials well enough to say.

Edited August 22, 2019 by fantastic_four

[@therealsilvermane]

5 minutes ago, fantastic_four said:

I'm seeing a trend of fans blaming Sony for this.  Which is bizarre since this was ENTIRELY because of Disney demanding more money.  And not just a little, a LOT more money.  Perhaps an unreasonably lot more...I haven't decided yet, I don't know the financials well enough to say.

[Bosco685]

48 minutes ago, @therealsilvermane said:

Jeremy Conrad is the lead for MCU Cosmic and has been rallying people to storm Sony so as to take Spider-Man's film rights back.

But good source there. Very reliable. 

[theCapraAegagrus]

I understand how negotiations work, but in the end, Marvel Studios should be pushing baby steps. Like 15% or something.

[@therealsilvermane]

58 minutes ago, theCapraAegagrus said:

I understand how negotiations work, but in the end, Marvel Studios should be pushing baby steps. Like 15% or something.

[theCapraAegagrus]

Has it been mentioned that Tom Holland un-followed Sony on both Twitter and Instagram?

#burn

[STORMSHADOW_80]

2 hours ago, fantastic_four said:

I'm seeing a trend of fans blaming Sony for this.  Which is bizarre since this was ENTIRELY because of Disney demanding more money.  And not just a little, a LOT more money.  Perhaps an unreasonably lot more...I haven't decided yet, I don't know the financials well enough to say.

That was my thought. As I broke to the news to my son yesterday he asked why and told him it was basically over money and they couldn't come to an agreement. His bias was automatically towards Sony, but I said maybe it's Marvel being too greedy. In any case maybe we'll see Spider-Man  without being the next Tony Stark.

...PS. Lets bring Andrew Garfield back and do a clone saga

[wiparker824]

3 hours ago, fantastic_four said:

I'm seeing a trend of fans blaming Sony for this.  Which is bizarre since this was ENTIRELY because of Disney demanding more money.  And not just a little, a LOT more money.  Perhaps an unreasonably lot more...I haven't decided yet, I don't know the financials well enough to say.

This. It's also as if people seem to be forgetting Marvel is the one that got themselves into this deal. Nobody forced Marvel to sell the rights away to Sony, and Sony isn't obligated to give them any piece of the pie yet alone 30 or as first reported 50%. Disney/Marvel are not the victims in this scenario.

[Bosco685]

3 hours ago, theCapraAegagrus said:

Has it been mentioned that Tom Holland un-followed Sony on both Twitter and Instagram?

#burn

Guess who started that rumor as well?

The same guy posting about marching on Sony Pictures to demand Spider-Man rights, and that he can't sleep until the rights return. So it must be true.

[fantastic_four]

2 hours ago, wiparker824 said:

This. It's also as if people seem to be forgetting Marvel is the one that got themselves into this deal. Nobody forced Marvel to sell the rights away to Sony, and Sony isn't obligated to give them any piece of the pie yet alone 30 or as first reported 50%. Disney/Marvel are not the victims in this scenario.

Sort of.  They had to raise a ton of money in 1996 when they filed for bankruptcy, so they had to sell something.  They sold what they had, which is film rights to intellectual property which had barely to that point made money in films.

If you're going to blame them for anything, blame them for not foreseeing based upon Terminator 2 and Jurassic Park that CGI would enable superheroes to come to the big screen like never before within just a few years.  But meh, the number of people who knew that in 1996 was a tiny fraction of the population.  I knew Jurassic Park had changed filmmaking forever, but it hadn't yet occurred to me that it would enable superheroes to finally hit the big screen.  Everyone reading this can silently decide if they had more foresight than Carl Icahan and Ron Perelman had circa 1996.    I don't mind admitting that it didn't occur to me until X-Men came out in 2000.

Edited August 22, 2019 by fantastic_four

[wiparker824]

53 minutes ago, fantastic_four said:

Sort of.  They had to raise a ton of money in 1996 when they filed for bankruptcy, so they had to sell something.  They sold what they had, which is film rights to intellectual property which had barely to that point made money in films.

If you're going to blame them for anything, blame them for not foreseeing based upon Terminator 2 and Jurassic Park that CGI would enable superheroes to come to the big screen like never before within just a few years.  But meh, the number of people who knew that in 1996 was a tiny fraction of the population.  I knew Jurassic Park had changed filmmaking forever, but it hadn't yet occurred to me that it would enable superheroes to finally hit the big screen.  Everyone reading this can silently decide if they had more foresight than Carl Icahan and Ron Perelman had circa 1996.    I don't mind admitting that it didn't occur to me until X-Men came out in 2000.

Right, but it’s not Sony’s fault Marvel was in financial trouble and sold the stake in Spider-man films to them. Marvel put the property up for sale, Sony took the gamble and it paid off for them. I don’t feel bad for Marvel/Disney and am not sure why anyone else does... 

[fantastic_four]

1 hour ago, wiparker824 said:

I don’t feel bad for Marvel/Disney and am not sure why anyone else does... 

Because they credit Marvel for great movies and very little beyond that.  Which is one of half a dozen reasons why I assume Iger is making this power play with Sony.

[wiparker824]

4 minutes ago, fantastic_four said:

Because they credit Marvel for great movies and very little beyond that.  Which is one of half a dozen reasons why I assume Iger is making this power play with Sony.

I’m not sure what you’re referring to exactly? Sony crediting Marvel for great movies? Why wouldn’t they? And why do you feel they owe Marvel anything else beyond what Marvel and Sony already agreed to financially? 

[STORMSHADOW_80]

2 hours ago, fantastic_four said:

Sort of.  They had to raise a ton of money in 1996 when they filed for bankruptcy, so they had to sell something.  They sold what they had, which is film rights to intellectual property which had barely to that point made money in films.

If you're going to blame them for anything, blame them for not foreseeing based upon Terminator 2 and Jurassic Park that CGI would enable superheroes to come to the big screen like never before within just a few years.  But meh, the number of people who knew that in 1996 was a tiny fraction of the population.  I knew Jurassic Park had changed filmmaking forever, but it hadn't yet occurred to me that it would enable superheroes to finally hit the big screen.  Everyone reading this can silently decide if they had more foresight than Carl Icahan and Ron Perelman had circa 1996.    I don't mind admitting that it didn't occur to me until X-Men came out in 2000.

I remember reading books in the 80s and 90s and it was discussed frequently in the bullpen bulletins and Stans soapbox how big a Spider-Man movie would be and they were just waiting for the technology. I think the foresight was there just not the money to invest themselves during the slump of mid 90s. Marvel did what they had to do. At least marvel was able to stay around by selling off some of their properties film rights. In a way Spider-Man saved marvel comics as did Star Wars in the lat 70s and even GI Joe brought in tons of new readers and was the #1 selling book in the 80s.

[justafan]

On 8/22/2019 at 6:56 PM, fantastic_four said:

Because they credit Marvel for great movies and very little beyond that.  Which is one of half a dozen reasons why I assume Iger is making this power play with Sony.

Well I I guess after the dust settles with the Fox merger and the Disney+ streaming launch and if it at least becomes sustainably profitable and at most out-gains Netflix in subscribers, then maybe Disney can set eyes on buying out Sony Studios to once and for all obtain the film rights to Spider-Man.  Unfortunately by that time they will have already been full swing with X-Men and FF reboots and would have to reboot Spider-Man with a new actor and new Universe of movies for him to fit into.  I'd much rather they come to an agreement sooner so that he could continue to exist in MCU but I'd be happy with an acquisition at a later date.

FTR: I did anticipate superheroes being a huge and imminent possibility after movies like T2, Jurassic Park but especially the Matrix. The Matrix movie's special effects were really what revealed what could be possible.  I'm sure other Marvel execs had inklings of it.  Too bad it was probably too late for Marvel by then and they needed cash now but couldn't just call up JG Wentworth.