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Spider-Man 4 Scrapped, Franchise Reboot Planned
derGoldstein writes "Yesterday we discussed which sci-fi should get the reboot treatment next. If you consider Spider-Man as 'proper sci-fi,' then it would appear that's the answer. 'Sony Pictures decided today to reboot the Spider-Man franchise after Sam Raimi pulled out of Spider-Man 4 because he felt he couldn't make its summer release date and keep the film's creative integrity. This means that Raimi and the cast including star Tobey Maguire are out. There will be no Spider-Man 4. Instead, the studio will focus on a reboot script by Jamie Vanderbilt with a new director and a new cast.'"
Perhaps Raimi is too busy working on other projects.
reboot to match todays youth preferences: think twilight in 3d.
They can't wait years, or the rights revert to Marvel (Disney). They'd rather crank out anything to keep them.
and these days they make it about 9.
I think it is partially the fact that they are using very young actors.
Of course, part of that is the comic book universe's problem.
Spider man was 18-26 for 40 years. In "reality", spider man in the comics should be in his late 60's.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Typically, a hollywood reboot means, "Grittier and darker". Realistic violence and a strong adult theme. Peter Parker can't just be tormented by his parent's death and angst ridden/repressed by Mary Jane's repeated attempts to ignore him, he must be really conflicted--perhaps they'll have him kill Aunt May. Also, Toby MacGuire is just too nice. They need an actor who looks like he kills babies and stomps on puppies to play Peter Parker. (eyes-rolling)...
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'Reboot,' in Hollywood-speak, means "Forget cannon. Forget the comics. Forget everything. Get a focus group of our target demographic and ask them what they want. Get a committee of corporate hack writers to write what's going to sell." Hollywood is lazy and incredibly risk-averse. They do not create art, they create vapid, bland, and safe pablum for the masses. They take art, and turn it into raw sewage. The occasional good movie that slips out is an anomaly. They will then take that rare good movie and turn it into raw sewage in sequels. Hollywood wants to create the sure thing, the thing that everyone will pay to see. They don't want to take risks on stories no one's heard of before, so the will continue raping the corpse of any successful franchise until the fans turn away in horror. Then they will 'reboot' its desecrated corpse.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
The first one wasn't bad, it just wasn't great. Worst casting choice was who they got to play Peter Parker. He's not a complicated character! He's a science nerd, yes. He's smart. He's also helplessly introverted. The introduction of the spiderman character to his life creates an alter ego. And this is where he cuts loose, being the irreverent, humorous wall-crawler of page and screen. That Toby McGuire guy could do mumbly and introverted but nothing else. This is not complex storytelling, folks. This is basic heroic mythmaking that goes all the way back to the paleolithic campfire. Hero good. Bad guy bad, but maybe have a beef we could sympathize with. Hero has a girl and he gets her in the end. And given the nature of the character, there should be plenty of laughs.
And for the sequels, all the stuff that was bad about the first movie was expanded upon. Spiderman 3 approached epic awful comic book movie status. Bad for the franchise but great for rifftrax.
The recent Iron Man movie was an example of how to do this. Perfectly crafted popcorn fare. Great characters, great lines, good 'splosions. Hope they don't screw the next one up.
Oh, and one quibble. So the Goblin guy from the first film had a super-serum and so became super-human. He can trade punches with super-human people because he's super-durable. I can buy that. Same goes for Goblin jr. But Doc Oc, he's just a dude with creepy robot arms. Even if those robot arms can kick eight kinds of ass, the guy they're attached to is still a flabby middle-aged science guy. Our friendly neighborhood spiderman is super-strong and a punch from him should cause disfiguring if not immediately fatal injuries. The guy's strong enough to hold up a frickin' cable car. His punch should be like from that freeway accident in Final Destination, where the log truck drops its load and this guy looks up just in time to see a 20 foot log come flying right through his windshield. We're talking a punch from a super-human should cause the head to shatter like a melon dropped from a six story building, a red mist everywhere, the now mostly headless body dropping while blood goes squirting everywhere. Ok, so that would completely screw the PG-13 rating but c'mon, seeing a podgy scientist shrug off those punches makes spiderman look lamer than Toby himself is managing.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
Each film made near a billion dollars. Raimi fought with the studios over the script for 3, which was terrible. So now the studio is forcing the same writer for 4, and gave him a contract to write future Spider-man movies as well. Let's keep the guy who wrote a TERRIBLE script, and punish a much-loved and successful director.
As Kevin Smith said, in Hollywood, you fail upwards.
I'm not suggesting that everything Raimi did was perfect, but when Spider-man 2 was released, many hailed it as the best superhero film of all time.
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That bugged me a bit as well with the spider-man movies. The web shooters issues are a issue in the comics and should have been left in for the movies. The web shooters failing/not working correctly can be funny/tragic and add to the movie like they do in the comics.
That would be way too implausible, even for the Spider-Man movies; a high school kid develops something that material scientists would take years to create in a high-tech lab if they could at all?
I'm more worried about JK Simmons! Who else could be as perfect a J Jonah Jameson?
Never underestimate the potential of Human stupidity. -Heinlein
God forbid they breach the cannon of Spider-Man.
"Reboot" means what it means, no more, no less. The last comic-book reboot was Batman Begins, a full-hearted plunge into the spirit and fiction of the original that terminated an increasingly lost and bewildered series of films.
No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
Seriously, it's only got an uptime of 8 years, it doesn't need to be rebooted yet!
i agree with every single one of your points, and yet fail to find what the problem is. we're talking about ENTERTAINMENT. empty, pointless, useless, entertainment. of course, with that statement i am precluding the possibility of something transformational. the original star wars, for instance, is a silly space opera, and yet, including for me, its been a source of much love and awe
however, as it has degraded into a weekly animation on the cartoon network with a IM-speak trash talking teenage padawan, i find i can't hold that against lucas, not even his 3 prequels. why?
because nothing lasts forever. you fall in love with something, and it changes. there's no way around this. getting frustrated about this fact of life will not change this fact of life
a lot of fan boys need to come to grips with the fact that nothing lasts forever, that everything degrades in quality over time, and that's just the way it is, and always will be
and that hollywood, milking the cow, rebooting a desecrated corpse, is business as usual, and always will be. you need to move on and find love for some other scifi franchise when your much loved series jumps the shark. railing against the world when that happens is just pointless sour grapes and wasted effort on your part
stop hating hollywood. just realize what is inevitable in this world and realize when it is time to move on
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
It goes deeper than that.
Removal of mechanical web shooters (and Peter's bug/trackers that key to his "spider sense") are examples of the shift of Spider Man's portrayal of science as a neutral force used by both good and evil, to an evil corrupting influence that only those of exceptional character can withstand.
In the comics (and 60's TV show) Peter is a budding scientist that becomes a superhero. His foes that use science/technology are already well on the path to "evil" long before they encounter the circumstances that turn them into supervillains. Science is portrayed as a neutral force that can be harnessed by good and evil alike.
In the movies, Peter is just a "nerd" who gets corrupted by science, and it's only by indirectly causing the death of his uncle that he gains the moral character to overcome the corrupting influence of science and become a force for good - although it's a battle he has to wage constantly. His foes? They are all good-natured individuals that become evil only because of the corrupting influence of science. Some are able to eventually fight the evil of science and become good again, and prove they are good by sacrificing themselves at the last minute.
I sincerely hope that any "reboot" of the series will bring back the tone of the comics.
What bugged me more was people's reaction to the lack of mechanical webshooters from the new movies. Since he was bitten by a spider what's wrong with acquiring it as a power in the movies. I'm a pedantic person but this detail is so minor that I don't understand why people care so much.
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At least twilight didn't take an existing character and castrate him like spiderman 3 did.
Ahem...
Emo sparkly vampires
Vampires don't sparkle in sun light, they burn. Taking away one of the most defining characteristics of vampires is sort of like castrating them.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.