The headline is a bit of a “duh” comment – Marvel and Sony have always had partnerships when working with Spider-Man movies, but this news is THE news you’ve been waiting for.
The announcement broke late this evening, and does indeed confirm a rumor that started way back in November during the Sony Pictures hack – Spider-Man is now part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
The next Spider-Man movie is scheduled to hit theaters on July 28, 2017 with Kevin Feige and Amy Pascal producing. This move comes at just the right time as fans are speculating who will be the center of the big fight in the upcoming Civil War storyline.
UPDATE: Here is the official press release from Marvel
Marvel’s Kevin Feige to Produce Next Installment of the Spider-Man Franchise with Amy Pascal
(Culver City, California, and Burbank, California February 09, 2015) – Sony Pictures Entertainment and Marvel Studios announced today that Sony is bringing Marvel into the amazing world of Spider-Man.
Under the deal, the new Spider-Man will first appear in a Marvel film from Marvel’s Cinematic Universe (MCU). Sony Pictures will thereafter release the next installment of its $4 billion Spider-Man franchise, on July 28, 2017, in a film that will be co-produced by Kevin Feige and his expert team at Marvel and Amy Pascal, who oversaw the franchise launch for the studio 13 years ago. Together, they will collaborate on a new creative direction for the web slinger. Sony Pictures will continue to finance, distribute, own and have final creative control of the Spider-Man films.
Marvel and Sony Pictures are also exploring opportunities to integrate characters from the MCU into future Spider-Man films.
The new relationship follows a decade of speculation among fans about whether Spider-Man – who has always been an integral and important part of the larger Marvel Universe in the comic books – could become part of the Marvel Universe on the big screen. Spider-Man has more than 50 years of history in Marvel’s world, and with this deal, fans will be able to experience Spider-Man taking his rightful place among other Super Heroes in the MCU.
Bob Iger, Chairman and CEO, The Walt Disney Company said: “Spider-Man is one of Marvel’s great characters, beloved around the world. We’re thrilled to work with Sony Pictures to bring the iconic web-slinger into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which opens up fantastic new opportunities for storytelling and franchise building.”
“We always want to collaborate with the best and most successful filmmakers to grow our franchises and develop our characters. Marvel, Kevin Feige and Amy, who helped orchestrate this deal, are the perfect team to help produce the next chapter of Spider-Man,” said Michael Lynton, Chairman and CEO of Sony Pictures Entertainment. “This is the right decision for the franchise, for our business, for Marvel, and for the fans.”
“Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios share a love for the characters in the Spider-Man universe and have a long, successful history of working together. This new level of collaboration is the perfect way to take Peter Parker’s story into the future,” added Doug Belgrad, president, Sony Pictures Entertainment Motion Picture Group.
“I am thrilled to team with my friends at Sony Pictures along with Amy Pascal to produce the next Spider-Man movie,” said Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige. “Amy has been deeply involved in the realization on film of one of the world’s most beloved characters. Marvel’s involvement will hopefully deliver the creative continuity and authenticity that fans demand from the MCU. I am equally excited for the opportunity to have Spider-Man appear in the MCU, something which both we at Marvel, and fans alike, have been looking forward to for years.”
Spider-Man, embraced all over the world, is the most successful franchise in the history of Sony Pictures, with the five films having taken in more than $4 billion worldwide.
ABOUT SONY PICTURES ENTERTAINMENT
Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) is a subsidiary of Sony Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Tokyo-based Sony Corporation. SPE’s global operations encompass motion picture production, acquisition and distribution; television production, acquisition and distribution; television networks; digital content creation and distribution; operation of studio facilities; and development of new entertainment products, services and technologies. For additional information, go to http://www.sonypictures.com/.
ABOUT MARVEL ENTERTAINMENT
Marvel Entertainment, LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company, is one of the world’s most prominent character-based entertainment companies, built on a proven library of more than 8,000 characters featured in a variety of media over seventy-five years. Marvel utilizes its character franchises in entertainment, licensing and publishing. For more information visit marvel.com. © 2015 MARVEL
Jump up and down Spider-Man fans – this is the moment you’ve been waiting for!
12 Comments
This makes it sound like we’ll be getting another casting for Peter Parker, then? I kind of liked Andrew Garfield in the role, even if the stories he was given weren’t the best.
Time to start the “who would you cast?” game again!
Great. Now let’s hope Marvel Studios doesn’t do a Marvel Comics and replace Peter Parker Spiderman with an equally valuable, but not nearly equally significant Miles Morales.
I bet we never see the man under the Spiderman mask in a Marvel movie.
This is some fantastic news.
So who do we want writing and directing? Tim Minear? (You know, the Firefly guy)
Who’s going to get cast? Thomas Brodie-Sangster? (I had to google Jojen Reed)
Maybe we could go back to having American superheroes played by Americans?
Well, it sounds good. Let’s just hope it can work. What gives me pause for concern is the part about Sony keeping final creative control & ownership. Marvel would make the better choice for both creative control and ownership with Sony retaining the distributive & marketing aspects of it. It would make more sense to me, but i’m just a fan so again I truly hope it can work. Baby steps.
Oh, and as far as who should direct. It’s Sam Raimi all the way.
I honestly didn’t expect to be as excited by this news as I am.
I know right?!
This move will make far more financial sense that putting a digital comic code on a movie ticket…but they should do that too.
I wonder if it’s too late for Marvel to slip Spidey into Age of Ultron. Quite a while ago on the main podcast Rodrigo outlined a way they could slip Daredevil into an MCU movie, it’d be awesome if they did something like that. I’ve been staying away from plot info as much as possible, does the action take place in New York again? They wouldn’t even need to show Spidey, just show something as simple as simple as a couple of Ultron’s lackey robots strung up in a web in the background during the battle and people would go nuts.
It wouldn’t surprise me if they found some way to slip him in for a brief cameo, even if it is just as an easter egg like a copy of the Daily Bugle with a “Spider-Man is a Menace” headline or something like the scene you described. I mean a lot of films do get some minor edits and such all the way up to just before opening day, and sometimes even have slightly altered editions by the time they come out on DVD. We’ve got just under two months before AoU comes out, so they have plenty of time to add something if they wanted.