RUMOR: Sony Pictures Has Paused All Its SPIDER-MAN Spin-offs - Including One Revolving Around Knull
RUMOR: Sony Pictures Has Paused All Its SPIDER-MAN Spin-offs - Including One Revolving Around Knull
There's a lot of hope that this is a sign that Sony and Disney have made a deal to return Spidey to Marvel.
Back in the before times, I remember Sony's deal was that they had to keep making movies in order to hold onto the rights.
This would be best. Post Secret Wars the door is wide open. Sony and Marvel can make an extended version of the Spider-man deal and in addition to mutants we can get all of Spider-Man's friends & enemies.
Superhero movie fatigue is real, and Sony's mediocre Spiderman villain spinoffs didn't help.
I'd argue that Sony was the reason for a lot of the superhero fatigue. The objectively worst MCU movie, QuantumMania, was still much better than Morbius, Kraven, and Madame Web. Some of the "bad" movies, like Eternals, Marvels, Love and Thunder, Multiverse of Madness, Black Widow, received disproportionately more hate than they deserved. As a lineup, it's all very mediocre, but they were spread out over several years. For fans, they were fun (flawed) excursions into each of those character stories. For non-fans, they were yet another opportunity to gleefully shit on superhero movies to drive engagement or to push a political agenda or just because they think superheroes are the reason we don't get auteur indie films anymore.
Eternals had too many characters and generic monster blobs. But the characters were nuanced and complex, and the plot wasn't nearly as incoherent as critics said.
They also had a gay hero and a disabled hero, and they gender-swapped two of the male heroes. Certain people didn't like that.
The Marvels had a boring villain and absurdly imbalanced stakes during the obliteration of two different plants and their native species. Also, a musical contrivance that I enjoyed more than most normal people.
They also had all female heroes, a female antagonist, and the first Muslim hero in films. Certain people didn't like that.
Look, if you line 'em all up in a row, it's basically the food court at the mall. There's a wide variety of options, maybe one or two that are good, the rest are also there, and some bigots are grumbling about weird people who aren't like them. That's post-Engame MCU. Sony is like that kiosk near the court that definitely isn't part of the food court, and they definitely don't have the requisite plumbing to have a handwashing sink. Their poor hygiene practices have drawn bugs and rats, and they have a big sign that says that napkins and condiments are only for their customers.
Getting rid of Sony doesn't make Marvel better, but it does reduce a lot of the strain on the viewing public.
To add to the "fatigue" you also have DC not helping out much either. Sony was definitely bottom barrel but even DC struggled at times to fill it even half way. (And sometimes they were absolutely garbage too.)
I think there was for a time a feeling that at least with Marvel you'd get something great. However when even they're just ok the whole field starts to look empty.
I think that's partially why Captain America Brave New World, despite being the worse film, generally did about the same as Thunderbolts. If a film is just going to be "ok" it should at least have some familiar faces.
The Marvels had a boring villain and absurdly imbalanced stakes during the obliteration of two different plants and their native species. Also, a musical contrivance that I enjoyed more than most normal people.
I enjoyed the Ms Marvel TV show for what it was, and the Kamala Khan character (and actor) getting a big screen appearance I thought was a good path. What irked me about the movie was that Ms Marvel was prevented from using her powers for 85% of the movie, only really being able to have a good showing in the final act. Further, we were told the MacGuffin bangle that let her amplify her powers from the TV show would give her godlike powers if she ever got the other one. Well she got the other one and it was barely a bump up.
There was also the contrived plot point about one race stealing air and water from other inhabited planets. Like, there are millions of other planets with air and water. Why doesn't Captain Marvel simply find one and help the antagonists pull air and water from those leaving the inhabited planets alone?
It wasn't the worst comic book movie I've seen though. I gave up watching Black Adam halfway through shortly after the "heroes" showed up and wanted to put the beatdown on the one entity pushing back against the oppressive mafia gang.
At this point it's more that they've all been pretty shit since no way home. Thunderbolts is the best one since then and it's just ok
Good.
Knull would make a shitty movie anyway.
He only barely works in the comics because of years (decades) of the building of symbiote lore. Trying to shoehorn him into the venom world of the movies or (worse) the mcu/sony Spider-Man movies would be horrible.
And Sony has already proven they no longer understand what to do with anyone from the spiderverse if it isn't animated. Venom, Madame Web, Morbius, all flawed , and that's being generous in the last two.
The Raimi trilogy were good, but even they were flawed in significant ways. Again, they didn't understand the characters very well. I love them anyway, but they relied a ton on Tobey carrying the load and established fandom to blur those flaws. Same with Garfield's turn.
Even Holland's movies have issues, they just aren't as glaring because the MCU proper started out with the assumption it isn't supposed to be 616 but a separate and distinct universe of its own, which means established fans and new ones can jump in at the same time.
But Knull? He's out of place, period. Even in the comics his whole story is just a "big bad for a crossover" excuse. Trying to use him in any movie is dubious, but trying it without establishing why he should matter is failboat