Update: Spiderman 4 Debacle

More information on the Spiderman 4 debacle! Apparently both Tobey Maguire and Sam Raimi are both for sure out of the continuing franchise. Yesterday Sony Pictures gave an official press release stating that director Marc Webb would be taking the job. The job of Peter Parker has still not been decided and rumors will probably continue to fly for quite some time. During the press release Amy Pascal, co-chairman of Sony Pictures Entertainment, hinted at a re-hashing of Spiderman’s origins. As this is exactly what Raimi and Maguire did it seems like an awful restart to the franchise. We’ve already seen the radioactive spider thing and having him learn to use all his powers so going back and doing all that yet again seems way too repetitious.

According to some that have seen the script reports are that Peter Parker already has his powers while in high school, so with luck there won’t be as much of the learning curve going on in these films. Especially since those of us that will be going to see this new Spiderman have most likely gone to see the first three.

Another reason these movies are getting a huge push is because of money. Sony didn’t want to have to wait two or three years between each of these blockbusters. They already had James Vanderbilt writing Spiderman 5 and 6 before Spiderman 4 even went into production. This coupled with story and villain choices and Raimi wanting a higher budget than Sony wanted to give led to a failed attempt. A big reason for this was the ballooning salaries of those actors that had contracts only for a trilogy leading to contracts needing to be renegotiated for the following movies.

Now with a new, younger and unknown, cast Sony can better control most of these costs. It seems the new budget only $80 million, much lower than Raimi’s problematic Spiderman 4. I’m still unsure what to think of this upcoming film. I know its a business and needs to be about making money, but sometimes I wish it could just be about making a good film.