If you read any of the Spider-Man-related emails from last December’s Sony hack, you’ll be aware that there was a lot of chatter about Drew Goddard (The Cabin in the Woods) potentially rebooting the franchise – so much so that several of the usual rumour-spreading sites attempted to guess themselves a scoop by claiming on more than one occasion that he’d actually signed on to direct the next take on the wall-crawler.
Fast forward a few months and we know that was never the case, with Jon Watts (Cop Car) on board to reboot the series with Tom Holland (The Impossible) as Peter Parker, and Goddard – who was previously attached to Sony’s aborted Sinister Six movie – has now been speaking to CinemaBlend about why he never got the job on the 2017 release:
“I mean, I think that’s more a question for [Sony and Marvel], but here’s the good news,” states Goddard. “I’ve worked with Marvel a lot. The way that Marvel sort of works is they say, ‘Hey, do you have an idea for… Here’s the movies we’re thinking about making…’ They sort of tell you the world what they’re thinking of making, and they sort of put out there, if you have an idea for any of these, come talk to us.”
SEE ALSO: Drew Goddard wanted Tom Hardy for Sandman in The Sinister Six
“And I think, with Spider-Man, I didn’t really have an idea,” he admits. “Part of that might have just been because I had just written one. I spent a year working on Sinister Six, and I think I was like in a head space where I just didn’t… you know, it’s very hard to say, ‘Ok, now write a new movie.’ So, it never got that far. We never, it never got taken that far. They know how much respect I have for them. They’ve been very nice to me over the years, and I know sooner or later, we’re going to find the right project. It’s all about timing.”
Goddard has had several brushes with Marvel, having been forced to vacate the Daredevil Netflix series to concentrate on Sinister Six, and he went on to discuss the Spidey-villain ensemble with Crave Online, describing it as “the epic Spider-Man movie of my dreams”:
“It’s not happening right now, but Hollywood is very volatile so you never know. On the off-chance we actually get to make it one day I want to keep it sort of quiet, but it was the epic Spider-Man movie of my dreams. Yeah, no, look, I loved it. We were deep in pre-production when the Sony hack happened and it was sad to see everything go down. But welcome to Hollywood.”
He then went on to confirm that he’s still involved with Marvel’s Daredevil series, albeit in an advisory capacity: “I’m still there, we were just in the writers room the other day, talking about season 2. The good news is just I wasn’t the showrunner, but all my friends are – we turned over season 1 to Steven Deknight and now Doug and Marco are doing season 2. And it’s a joy because I just get to show up and talk about Matt Murdock which is what I love to do. The show’s in great with those guys and when they need help, I fly on in.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=PL18yMRIfoszEaHYNDTy5C-cH9Oa2gN5ng&v=qvTY7eXXIMg
Originally published September 14, 2015. Updated November 8, 2019.
