Originally published August 24, 2014. Updated April 15, 2018.
Anghus Houvouras on how Sony has sabotaged Spider-Man….
Imagine you’re in the driver’s seat of a billion dollar franchise. One of the most iconic heroes of our time, one of the most successful cinematic adaptations of the 21st century. Then imagine taking your hands off the wheel and…
I was watching Everton and Arsenal going toe to toe this weekend when I saw an ad for The Amazing Spider-Man 2 on Blu-ray. Like most ads they promoted the additional content. “13 deleted scenes”, the announcer cried. “See Peter meet his father!”
What? The father who vanished in the first film, then presumably died in the opening minutes of the sequel? That father? You mean there’s a scene from the script, filmed for the movie where Peter’s father survives and show’s up at Gwen Stacy’s grave? Seriously?
This makes sense for a movie series that often feels like a ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’ story created in the editing room. The story, the mythology, all of it feels made up on the spot. The story seems to have no direction or well charted plot. For example, bringing Shailene Woodley on board as Mary Jane Watson which now seems like genius due to her success in Divergent and The Fault in Our Stars. But hold on: then they decide to jettison her entirely until The Amazing Spider-Man 3, or perhaps entirely as new rumors surface about Gwen Stacy making a return from the grave as Carnage. It feels like no one, not even the writers and the directors know where this franchise is going. It’s a rudderless boat drifting on the waters perilously close to crashing into the rocks. The first Amazing Spider-Man shed a quarter of a billion dollars from the bottom line, and the second made even less, which seems inconceivable in a box office landscape where other studios are actually making impressive gains with their superhero films. More on that in a moment.
Then we have the strange game of musical chairs being played with the franchise. The Amazing Spider-Man 3 has been back-burnered in favor of a Sinister Six movie that I’m not sure anybody wants or even knows how it fits into this strange new paradigm they are trying to establish. Everyone who isn’t Marvel has faltered somewhat with expanding their cinematic universes. Warner Bros. finally seems to be wising up to the potential for their characters on film. 20th Century Fox has made some headway taking the X-Men to new box office plateaus. Sony is the only studio with licensed superheroes who can’t seem to figure out the formula, in spite of practically creating it with their original Spider-Man movies.
Every film fan indulges in their fair share of armchair movie producing. The more sanctimonious ones are often quite vocal about the ‘mistakes’ Hollywood studios make with their favorite characters. I’m beginning to give credence to the naysayers when it comes to Sony and their Amazing Spider-Man films. They are the Frankenstein’s Monster of films, stitching together characters and pot points from the comics with less than surgical precision.
I can’t think of another franchise that feels so completely mismanaged. Sony has made countless mistakes with their second attempt at Spider-Man and continue to double down on the less-than-amazing results both creatively and financially. Sony is digging a massive hole right now and is starting to look clueless in how to manage their only superhero franchise sabotaging the character’s cinematic endeavors.
Do you think the Amazing Spider-Man franchise can be salvaged?
Anghus Houvouras is a North Carolina based writer and filmmaker. His latest work, the novel My Career Suicide Note, is available from Amazon. Follow him on Twitter.
