New Spider-Man Deal Between Disney & Sony:
There have been a few major incidents where the internet was lit on fire. One happened back when Ben Affleck was cast as Batman. Then the second incident like that, which actually angered fans for a long time was the fact that Sony & Disney recently split over the use of Spider-Man. They ultimately got back and everyone got what they wanted. But it wasn’t a smooth ride for the fans as they had to wait for more than a month before Sony & Disney got on the same page.
The original news that came out painted Disney as the bad guy. It claimed that Disney was demanding a 50% co-financing stake in future solo Spider-Man movies and Sony backed out of it. But later, it was confirmed that they had actually made an offer of 25% co-financing stake initially, for which Sony didn’t respond for more than 6 months. So, that is what led to Disney making the offer of 50%.
Sony blamed this on the merger of Disney-Fox where Disney had got their hands on so many bankable properties. Sony stated that Kevin Feige was stretched thin, and Disney didn’t want him to spend time on a property that they didn’t own. So yea, the argument from both sides was understandable. Disney wanted to have a bit of a stake in the Spider-Man movie because it was the branding of MCU that was making Spider-Man a massive success on the Box Office. But Spider-Man obviously is Sony’s biggest property so they did not want to share half of their profits.
Then all of a sudden when the dust settled, a new announcement came. Spider-Man 3 got a release date in the MCU. Sony & Disney had got back together and both of them got what they were after. Disney wanted a stake in Spider-Man solo films and they got that. Sony wanted to use Spider-Man with Venom and other from Sony’s Universe of Marvel Characters, and they got that too. The fans finally got the satisfaction of seeing Spider-Man in the MCU. So it was a triple win situation, and that’s what both Disney & Sony execs agree with.
Disney’s Alan Horn and Sony’s Tom Rothman spoke to the Hollywood Reporter about the Spider-Man negotiations and they claimed that things would have happened much sooner if it wasn’t for the media. Rothman described the new deal as:
“…A classic win-win-win. A win for Sony, a win for Disney, a win for the fans. The only thing I would say is that news cycles and the rhythm of negotiations do not necessarily overlap. And this is, in the words of Shakespeare, a consummation devoutly to be wished. We would have gotten there, and the news got ahead of some things.”
Obviously, there were tons of rumors about the Sony Disney negotiations. There were rumors about things that weren’t true at all. That had caused people from Disney & Sony playing the blame game. But ultimately, the Studios took their merry time to get back together, and this was actually understandable. Both companies waited for the dust to settle before getting back in the same room. And, the credit does go to Tom Holland as he was the one who reached out to Sony & Disney execs personally to get them in the same room.
Well, it’s water under the bridge now as we don’t have to find out how Sony would have handled Spider-Man suddenly not getting to take the name of Tony Stark, and how Marvel would have explained the sudden absence of Spider-Man. We’re glad that Spider-Man is back to the MCU for at least 2 more appearances, if not more. Spider-Man 3 has been scheduled for July 16, 2021 & Spider-Man will appear in one more MCU movie after that. We’re also looking forward to him making a cameo in Venom 2. Let’s see what the future holds.
