It’s been several weeks since the initial reports about Spider-Man no longer being a part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe surfaced. Even so, it remains one of the most hotly debated topics in the industry and everyone seems ready to pick sides. Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn has called for fans to relax, while Hawkeye himself, Jeremy Renner, went to social media to plead for a resolution that would keep the web-slinger in the MCU.
Now, comic legend and the creator of Marvel’s Venom, Todd McFarlane has dropped his own two cents on the debacle. During a recent interview, the Spawn visionary stated:
If you are Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, HBO, you’re looking at all these movies called “Avengers” that are making all this money, and you want comic book stuff. They have to take a sharpie and they have to black out those top 94 properties. Because if they’re not Disney or Warner Brothers, they’re just not getting it.
It’s clear that McFarlane is pointedly on Team Sony here, at least from a business perspective. And in that regard, what he’s saying makes a lot of sense.
Year in and year out, the Marvel movies rank among the highest grossing films to be released. This year alone, all three MCU efforts – Captain Marvel, Avengers: Endgame and Spider-Man: Far From Home – have generated over $1 billion in box office receipts. Endgame, in particular, nearly tripled that total. Given that Far From Home is Sony’s first billion dollar hit, ever, it’s clear why they’re unwilling to turn over more of a share of the profits than they have to.
Things aren’t as doom and gloom as fans are making it out to be, though. Sony seems to have learned from their past mistakes when adapting Spidey stories, as evidenced by the Academy Award-winning Into the Spider-Verse. And though it’s a long shot, there’s still a chance for the two media conglomerates at odds over Spider-Man to find a new common ground. Fingers crossed.
