I love Spider-Man. He’s been my hero since I could understand what that meant. I grew up in a comic book household with Stan Lee as my prophet guiding me through a world of all things incredible, uncanny, and fantastic, but most of all, amazing.
Today I’m a lonely kid with parents going through a break-up. Some therapist probably said once that writing is a good way to get all your feelings out. So that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to write my emotions about Spider-Man, his Spider-Verse, and the varying Spider-Movies we’ve had through the years.
Okay. In case you haven’t heard, Sony and Marvel (read Disney) have reached an impasse when it comes to how to divvy up the literal billions of dollars Spider-Man brings their respective companies (Insert link to the whole. Freaking. Internet.) This time yesterday, Disney received a modest amount of the Spider-Man box office, controlled merchandise (because DISNEY), and was allowed to use the Spider-Man character in their other movies. Sony got the rest of those sweet sweet ticket sales and owned the rest of the Spider-Canon including Morbius, Kraven the Hunter, Black Cat, Silver Sable, The Sinister Six, and approximately 100 other Spider-Adjacent characters.
Today it’s a different story.
How Did We Get Here?
It would confuse a 10-year-old today but there was once a time when the X-Men were cooler than the Avengers. A medieval time when normal people would recognize the Fantastic Four but not the Guardians of the Galaxy. A beautiful time when Spider-Man was the coolest hero in the Marvel pantheon, not the kid sidekick to Robertony Downey Iron Jr. That time is known as BMCU (Before Marvel Cinematic Universe) or also 2007.
The history of the MCU has been told, considering their era defining Endgame just became the highest grossing movie of all time and last year’s Marvel Stud10s Infinity War is also in the top five of that money grabbing, Disney owned list. They had sold the movie rights to all their popular characters and in 2008 decided to start making a series of loosely connected movies on their own with all the leftovers. Movies that were originally distributed with partners like Paramount or even co-produced with Universal.
First of what I can only assume will be a distracting number of sidenotes:
Sure people know that the MCU was launched with Iron Man in 2008, but Hulk was still a more popular character at the time and also had a movie release that year. The MCU’s sophomore outing is still the worst received movie out of their 23 so far in terms of critic reviews and ticket sales. But it’s still the MCU and Ant-Man got a sequel, why not Hulk? And with Captain Marvel and Deadpool doing well, why not a movie about a strong successful lawyer lady that broke the fourth wall in the comics like She-Hulk? Because Universal still holds distribution and right of first refusal for solo Hulk films.
Fun tidbits in that museum of an article from ’06. (Click on the link. Actually click all the links in my articles. My personal favorite is in the last paragraph from my first piece on 1999 movies.)
- Marvel was considering David Duchovny for its new Hulk film.
- Marvel reacquired Hulk movie rights after “[Universal] had not met its deadlines for beginning principal photography on the next Hulk project.”
The Spider-Story Of It All
Which brings us back to my man Spider-Man. The Sam Raimi trilogy ended on a whimper, after studio meddling, in 2007. MCU launches with Iron Man AND Hulk in 2008. By 2012 we had an all new Spider-Cast and Spider-Director for The Amazing Spider-Man 1 & 2.
It’s sort of common knowledge but weird enough to mention, that studios were forced to release movies using these characters on a deadline in order to retain the rights. This keeps people from squatting on characters (or patents or Twitter handles. Looking at you @collwyn and your one tweet ever.) It also keeps the characters in the zeitgeist. It doesn’t allow for any natural breathing room for the character.
Batman & Robin released in 1997 and it was eight years before Chris Nolan swung the Bat-Pendulum (I’m making spider-puns during this article, but Batman really corners the market on that joke) back to dark and gritty. This happened because the Schumacher movies were viewed as critical jokes. But I propose, it was also because Batman has that range in his character over the years. Spider-Man 3 was weird, but we didn’t get an all-new, all-different Spider-Man out of Marc Webb/Andrew Garfield. He was a little stuttery and his girlfriend was a blonde, but he still focused on power and responsibility and surviving school as a nerd. I love Spider-Man because he is familiar, but he can get stale when you keep rebooting the same basic version of the character.
My ranking of Spider-Portrayals:
- Christoper Daniel Barnes (90’s Spider-Man the Animated Series)
- Tom Holland
- Tobey Maguire
- Drake Bell (Yeah, that Drake Bell, from Ultimate Spider-Man)
- Yuri Lowenthal (From the newest Spider-Video Game)
- 50 feet of Spider-Crap
- Andrew Garfield
The Amazing Spider-Mans were both bottom box office earners for the character, but not quite franchise killingly bad as Superman IV: The Quest for Peace. They were just bad enough to get Sony to the table with Marvel. See by the Summer of 2014 Peter Quill and the A-Holes out grossed a freaking Spider-Man movie by 60%. Obviously Marvel had the secret sauce, and I imagine Sony wanted in on the party.
That beautiful marriage immediately birthed Captain America: Civil War.
Every scene with Tom Holland in that movie makes me forget how lame Baron Zemo is and how awk Chris Evans looked kissing the gorgeous Emily VanCamp. This is my Spider-Man. A well meaning kid trying his best, stronger than he understands, and ridiculously smart. We didn’t need to trot out and murder Uncle Ben again or see a radioactive arachnid bite Pete. This was just Spider-Man. Another hero in the wide tapestry that the MCU knitted that makes you believe that heroes are out there.
And then we got Homecoming where Marvel finally came up with a good villain and Far From Home where they might have outdone themselves. Spider-Man is the emotional punch in Infinity War and, I mean, he’s there and cute in Endgame. That movie was about the original 6 and had story issues but whatever. We were living the good life in the MCU.
So who are the best MCU villains?
- Thanos (in Infinity War. Definitely not Endgame.)
- The Vulture
- Mysterio
- Killmonger
- Loki (Honestly every time he’s on the screen)
- Robert Redford/Hydra
- Ultron (Ok I liked Ultron. Also he is the owner of my current favorite MCU fan theory.)
Sony, meanwhile, was plotting their out cinematic universe. Since the shameless Hall of Spinoffs in Amazing Spider-Man 2 they have been jonesing for a Sinister Six movie. And since Spider-Man 3 everyone has been jonesing for a good Venom on screen.
And we still are.
But Venom made money internationally so here we are.
Also Into the Spider-Verse was adored by critics and when your animation department follows up The Emoji Movie and Hotel Transylvania 3: Adam Sandler Goes on Vacation but Animated with anything, it’ll look good in comparison.
So Into the Spider-Verse was good but expensive and made no money, and Venom was bad but made boatloads of money. After those *successes* Sony thinks they can take over a character that they have been mishandling for over 10 years.
And it’s not like Marvel is blameless. Kevin Feige is now busy churning out three movies a year + (it’s a plus sign because that’s Disney’s thing now) all the Super Movies/miniseries/reasons we will all sign up for Disney+ in November. And Spider-Man was conspicuously absent from their Comic Con three year plan. Oh and the whole asking for a non-negotiable spike in money thing.
Who’s To Blame? Not Us.
So me, Spider-Man, and millions of fans are stuck in the middle when things were finally coming together. X-Men and the Fantastic Four have arrived to the House of Mouse and Spider-Man has opened up his universe to any crossover they want.
Sony can in universe make stand alone movies because they can just happen in alternate universes. Maybe Miles Morales accidentally swings into Tom Hardy’s Venom for a second before introducing a world with its own Sinister Six before heading back home.
Maybe that’s what’ll happen in Lord and Miller’s new Sony TV Spider-Series.
It’s early in the Spider-Process and I still have enough denial in me that I hope that mom and dad can just figure things out. But if Sony can make a good Spider-Man on their own, and Marvel can continue their connected universe without Mr. Holland then I guess I can be happy getting two Christmases every year.