This summer, news broke that Spider-Man, a character who’s film rights belong to Sony, would exit the Disney fueled MCU due to negotiations failing between the two companies. This comes off of the stellar release of Spider-Man: Far From Home, which went on to become one of Sony’s highest grossing movies of all time.
The movie also set many future MCU storylines in effect and dealt with several lingering narratives that were not wrapped up in Endgame, such as how the world went on during the snap. Many were left wondering how an MCU less Spider-man would tackle these ideas going forward, how the third film starring Tom Holland would fare without the MCU elements that were injected everywhere. Well, Thankfully, Sony and Disney have made up and Spidey is back in the MCU. Well, sort of.
While there have been reports of Sony and Disney agreeing to new terms, this agreement is on a picture by picture basis and if the rumors are true, it’s only so Sony can write Spider-Man out of the MCU and avoid a messy script that has to avoid many of the MCU trappings. See, the rumor is that Sony wants this version of Spider-Man to tackle their version of Venom, who exists on a different Earth. By writing the Spider-Verse into the next Spider-Man, a multi-dimension world that was shown to moviegoers in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse movie, an animated film that won an Oscar no less, it would allow Sony to have Spider-Man enter their world and leave the MCU behind, for the time being.
Now, this is all a rumor, but it would make sense why Sony agreed to come back to the table, and allow Disney to make the deal last a bit longer and hopefully convince Sony that Spidey belongs shared between them, and for good reason. With the X-Men and Fantastic Four entering the picture within the next 4-5 years, seeing ol’ Web head, Johnny Storm, and Wolverine in a film together would be mind blowing.
This new deal, where Disney will take in 25% of the box office profits, was made late last Thursday night. This involved Sony Pictures chief, Tom Rothman, Kevin Feige, and Walt Disney Studio co-chairs, Alan Bergman, and Alan Horn. Kevin Feige, the orchestrator of the MCU will help produce the film and add that MCU magic into it as he has done so many times before. The deal also states that Spidey will star in another single untitled Marvel film. As there are currently no Avenger’s movies revealed to be in production, it’s unclear what film that would be at this time.
The untitled third Spider-Man film, which has Spidey dealing with the fallout of Far from Home, especially during a scene that many people may have missed due to it being an end credits tag, will release in theaters July 16th, 2021, at which point, we should have a good idea on what other MCU film he will star in next.
Stay tuned to Analog Stick Gaming for more info on your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man.