It might seem like the Marvel Cinematic Universe is going from strength to strength, having recently delivered the biggest movie of all time while also simultaneously setting out their plans for dominating the small screen, but the fallout from the end of the studio’s working agreement with Sony that forcibly removed Spider-Man from their slate seems to have thrown a serious spanner in the works.
Soon after Far From Home crossed the billion dollar mark at the box office, fans were sent into a state of shock when it was announced that Sony had decided to wrestle control of the web-slinging superhero away from Kevin Feige, throwing the MCU’s plans for the future into complete turmoil. Marvel Studios put on a brave face, with a raft of film and television projects announced in the weeks that followed, while Spidey fans around the world took to their keyboards to voice their disapproval, going so far as to try and enlist both Ryan Reynolds and Robert Downey Jr. for help.
Fingers have been crossed in the hope that Sony and Marvel could reach a new deal, given how Tom Holland’s Peter Parker seemed set to be one of the MCU’s most important characters in Phase Four and beyond, but in a recent interview, Sony Pictures Chairman and CEO Tony Vinciquerra seems to have poured cold water all over the idea, somehow managing to both compliment and criticize Kevin Feige in the same sentence.
“For the moment the door is closed. We had a great run on the Spider-Man movies. We tried to see if there’s a way to work it out… the Marvel people are terrific people, we have great respect for them, but on the other hand we have some pretty terrific people of our own. Kevin Feige didn’t do all the work.”
No offense to Sony, but they’re kind of ruining a good thing with this. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse may have been an absolute triumph, but the studio hasn’t exactly got the best track record when it comes to handling the wall-crawler in live action. Sam Raimi walked away from Spider-Man after Sony’s interference became too much to handle, while the Marc Webb-directed reboots felt like they bore the grubby fingerprints of executive meddling.
The success of Venom may have spurred Sony to go at it alone, and while the prospect of seeing Tom Holland’s Spider-Man go face-to-face with Tom Hardy’s Eddie Brock seems like a tantalizing idea on paper, if Sony somehow find a way to mishandle the iconic comic book character for the third time in a little over a decade, then the fans might actually follow through with their threat to storm the studio’s headquarters.
