Both of Sony’s previous attempts at building a successful Spider-Man franchise have ultimately failed due to the studio’s inability to stop themselves from interfering. Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 3 was a huge disappointment compared to the first two, which still rank among the finest comic book movies ever made, and a lot of that had to do with the filmmaker compromising his vision in order to keep the executives happy.
The Amazing Spider-Man series, meanwhile, suffered from much the same fate, with Marc Webb’s sequel creaking under the weight of trying to expand the mythology and lay the foundations for Drew Goddard’s Sinister Six spinoff, not to mention the third and fourth outings for Andrew Garfield’s Peter Parker that had already been given release dates before the second one was even finished.
You’d hope that Marvel Studios would manage to avoid those pitfalls, but Sony still have significant creative input over the MCU’s Spider-Man franchise, and the latest rumors would seem to indicate that the web-slinger’s next outing could be set to double down on the bad guys, which has never worked out very well for the character on the big screen before.
We already know that Jamie Foxx’s Electro will be back, but a new report from FandomeWire now claims that Kraven the Hunter, Scorpion and Green Goblin will also be added into the mix. Michael Mando already appeared as Mac Gargan in Spider-Man: Homecoming, of course, and Kraven is getting his own movie at Sony as part of the SPUoMC, but Norman Osborn’s nefarious alter-ego is a new addition to the rumor mill.
Too many villains has never been a good thing for any comic book blockbuster, and if this is indeed all true, then hopefully the MCU’s Spider-Man 3 doesn’t fall into the same traps.