What A Tangled Web: Spider-Man 4 Killed. Raimi, Maguire Out

Has there ever been a superhero movie franchise as bizarre as Spider-Man?

When I saw the first film back in 2002, I thought it worked as a piece of pop fluff, but didn’t quite register on any of the emotional levels one would hope for from one of the most popular comic series in print. Then I almost refused to see Spider-Man 2 which, prior to The Dark Knight, turned out to be the best superhero film ever made. I bought into Peter Parker’s big-screen world lock stock and barrel. Sam Raimi was a god. (More at Techland: See the 5 Underrated Sci-Fi Movie Masterpieces)

And then there was Spider-Man 3. The disgusting, dismaying, disheartening defamation known as Spider-Man 3. Epic fail. No more need be said about that (though we have plenty more to say about the other worst superhero films of all time)

Now late Monday comes the news that Spider-Man 4, which had been in the middle of script disputes, has been killed and gutted. From Deadline Hollywood:

Raimi told Sony Pictures: “I can’t make your date. I can’t go forward creatively.” And, so, once he said “That’s it”, Sony Pictures co-chairman Pascal and Columbia Pictures’ Matt Tolmach decided they didn’t want to replace him and instead chose to reboot the franchise. Insiders also tell me that Tobey Maguire heard the news in a phone call with Amy today. I’m told Tobey wasn’t upset…There will be no Spider-Man 4. Instead, Mike Fleming is told, the studio will focus on a Summer 2012 reboot from a script by Jamie Vanderbilt with a new director and a new cast.

So yep, gone is the director. And the talent. And all on the heels of John Malkovich’s revelation that he was to play The Vulture in the movie. Instead, think reboot. We’ll be getting a whole new cast, in a 3-D venture, in 2012, as Sony attempts to revamp a franchise that had gotten so very, very bland (see the YouTube clip below)

I’m fine with the news. Actually more than fine. There is now talk that Raimi might be hopping over to World of Warcraft instead.

To quote my colleague Peter Ha: “Why?! Why are they making another Spider-Man movie?!” (See Techland’s top 10 sci-fi movies of the decade)

The good news Peter: “They” aren’t making it any more.

The bad news: Someone else is.

charlieromeobravo

I’d call it a mercy killing except… reboot? That smells of disaster. We don’t need another Spider-man origin story so soon, but if they don’t do that then it’ll just be Spidey 4 with a new cast and crew. Like the X-men flicks, the first two Spider-man movies were solid films so they’d be walking a very fine line trying to do another with a whole new set of people behind it. Maybe they just need to let this one lie for a while…
adamskikne

Batman Begins was a reboot…
charlieromeobravo

How long after the first Tim Burton Batman? 16 years and 3 crappy sequels, 8 years after Batman And Robin which really killed the franchise. A relaunch was in a much better position because it had a radically different vision and no one cared about the last couple of movies from the previous franchise. THat’s not the case with Spider-man. They had 2 great movies and the 3rd went off the rails. They need a little time to let it rest before reworking it. If they release in 2012 it’s not a reboot, it’ll just be Bat-man Forever.
http://djtrudeau.wordpress.com djtrudeau

I don’t trust the same studio forces that forced changes in Spider-man 3 to do a great job with a whole new vision. This is a typical Hollywood move. Once a series takes off under the vision of someone like Raimi, people in the studio convince themselves that they’re the auteurs and want to grab the steering wheel. The new Spidey might beat the odds and be decent, but don’t bet on it. I like the screenwriter working on it, but it’s not like his script will be treated as sacred. The big push now is to squeeze as much money out of it as possible, so expect lots of “extreme” elements and other out-of-date notions on how to cater to kids.

The sad part is that it will probably still take in a lot of money, if not the movie following.
charlieromeobravo

“I don’t trust the same studio forces that forced changes in Spider-man 3″

Did Sony force changes in the movie? I honestly don’t know but I left the theater thinking that if they had divided it into two movies it would have worked better. I thought that it was a mess because the original crew (or maybe just Rami?)had a bunch of good ideas and they figured it was going to be the last one they did. It felt like they tried to cram a bunch of competing stuff into it and the results just didn’t work.

I agree though, the odds of 4 being any good are slim if it’s being steered by Sony with an eye on a release date first and foremost. Look no further than the 3rd and 4th Batman movies from the 90′s, X-men 3, Electra to see what happens when suits start driving the process.
http://lancealvis.wordpress.com lancealvis

Feels like two Hulks too close.
charlieromeobravo

Exactly. To do a reboot well they need to allow some time for the previous version to fade from our memories. It also helps if the previous attempts weren’t very good and, imo, Spider-man is 2 for 3.
suiter

@charlieromeobravo: I can’t remember exactly what the story was but the Studio did indeed force changes on the movie. I believe the director wanted it to be about just Sandman and New Goblin, with the next movie focusing on Venom, but the studio wanted Venom in it too and we ended up with the hunk of crap that came out.

Similar to X3 actually. That director wanted it to be about the Pheonix, the studio wanted more. They had another script that could have been X4 but they made them combine the two scripts and voila, another hunk of garbage.
suiter

Oh and I almost forgot. They’re also talking about rebooting Fantastic Four already as well.
http://djtrudeau.wordpress.com djtrudeau

@suiter: The sad part is that the studios are often rewarded for doing just that. Spider-man 3 and X3 made a significant amount of money. For that matter, so did Batman Forever.
charlieromeobravo

@suiter

If the FF are getting a reboot already, Spider-man getting a reboot already, I think what we’re seeing here is really the final implosion of the super hero movie genre. It’s had a really good run the last 10-ish years but they may be beating it to death now.

Marvel has (last I saw) 2 movies per year scheduled for the next several years. Thor, Captain America, The Avengers, Deadpool, another Wolverine, another X-men, another Ghost Rider, another Iron Man, another Spider-man, Magneto, Nick Fury, Luke Cage all in some stage of development and that’s just Marvel. Green Lantern, Flash, and a 3rd Batman are all in the works from DC (that I’m aware of).

They’re killing the genre under a tidal wave of properties. People who aren’t comic book readers are having a hard time keeping all these titles and how they relate to each other straight. I’d hate to see genre burn out keep the movies that could be really good (I’m looking at you Batman 3!) from getting their due…