Sony’s Spiderman-less movies’ final wave
Sony has made some real bone-headed decisions with their Spider-Man movies over the years. I’ll never forgive them for showing the final moment of Amazing Spider-Man 2 in the trailer, when Spidey swings a man-hole cover at the Rhino. Especially since there was no ending to that scene and it just cut to black. But that’s just scratching the surface on how badly they bungled this franchise, with their own Spider Man movies.
To be fair, the Spider-Man movies generally are pretty good. Even when they are more campy, goofy, or dopey then they should be (like the Sam Raimi – Tobey Maguire third film Spider Man 3,) they still have more to offer than some of the more recent MCU films (the Eternals, the Marvels, Ant Man 3,) or more recent DC films (the Flash, Blue Beetle, Aquaman 2.) And that has a lot to do with the way the market has gone.
You see, back then, when Maguire and Andrew Garfield were turning out Spider-Man movies, those films were some of the only superhero movies in town. It was Spider-Man and X-Men and Blade. Thats it. And so getting a new superhero movie every couple of years, instead of every couple of months had value. And even if the movie wasn’t perfect, we appreciated it for what it was.
But to get back to the ways that Sony has bungled this property, close to a decade ago, Sony decided to make a deal with Marvel. The deal was that Spider-Man would be in the MCU. Not only would he be in Avengers movies, but all new Spider-Man movies would be part of the MCU and feature other MCU characters. And Sony would keep the profits of these Spider-Man movies. Now that was most certainly not a mistake. In fact it turned out some of the best Spider-Man movies we’ve ever seen. It was a win-win on all levels except one. Sony signed over the rights (in a sense,) to their first born child… Spider-Man, himself.
The new Spider-Man, now in the MCU, was played by Tom Holland. And he was the perfect fit. Young enough to look the part as he walks down those high school halls, an actor who could really do the flips and acrobatics, Holland was the total package. On top of that, all three of his standalone movies (Homecoming, Far From Home, and No Way Home,) were pretty good. So merging Spidey with Marvel was not a problem at all, and was actually a stroke of genius. Or was it?
The problem was that in making this deal, Sony apparently agreed not to use Spider-Man in their own movies. Now here’s where it gets a little complicated, because technically those three Tom Holland films are Sony movies, Sony still gets most of the money from them. But they just can’t use Spider-Man themselves. And what really makes that obvious is that they have been trying to get their own cinematic universe featuring just Spideys villains, off the ground for some time now.
It’s almost too stupid to believe. A movie about Morbius? Another one about Kraven the Hunter. Another one about Madame Web. And no Spider-Man anywhere to be found in these films. Now let’s backtrack a minute and talk about the best of these films, and the one that got this idea of theirs started… Venom. The first Venom movie was a success. It wasn’t great or anything, but it was guilty pleasure level fun. And it featured some very talented actors in Tom Hardy, Michelle Williams, and Rhiz Ahmed.
It wasn’t Iron Man level excellence (the way that movie kick-started the MCU,) but it was enough for Sony to not only green light a sequel, but launch a whole bunch of other movies that also had some sort of connection to Spider-Man. And here’s the problem. I’d like to be able to say that the Venom movie got Sony to green light a cinematic universe, even without Spider-Man. Had they taken a playbook from Marvel, with Iron Man, they could have and should have done that.
Venom or at least Eddie Brock, should have appeared in Morbius. I don’t care how bad Morbius was (the Ed Norton Incredible Hulk film that followed Iron Man and featured a Tony Stark cameo wasn’t exactly great either,) but at least it would be advancing the ball… spinning one movie into the next. Venom and Morbius should have both been in Madame Webb. It’s not rocket science. The Fast and the Furious movies did it, and half of those are garbage. But there has to be connectivity between movies. And somehow Sony missed that memo.
And so now here we are in the late months of 2024, staring down the barrel of not one, but two Sony Spider-Man-less movies about to be released. Venom the Last Dance and Kraven the Hunter. And I could care less that Spider-Man isn’t in these movies, at this point. We’re over that. We’ve come to accept it. But the fact that Sony refuses to connect their own movies is the most baffling thing of all.
The other thing that doesn’t make any sense… how has Sony not made a live action Miles Morales Spider-Man movie? He could actually be their Spider-Man in their movies. And somehow they don’t realize that one either. I think the only explanation behind any of these ridiculous blunders is money. Sony must think if they even green light a Miles Morales movie, it might hurt their animated Spiderverse trilogy, featuring that character. They must think that if they connect their movies, then some of the stinkers will run off on the new films. It doesn’t work that way Sony. People are suckers for Easter Eggs and connective tissue. Hopefully with these next two movies Sony finally figures that out. Otherwise, this really might be the last dance.