By now you know the long, dramatic saga that has been Peter Parker's return to the big screen — and inclusion in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
As Marvel Comics' most popular character, Marvel Studios has long wanted to get back the rights to the character, but those rights are held tightly in the grasp of Sony Pictures. Sony hasn't done well with the wall-crawler though, with The Amazing Spider-Man 2 garnering negative reactions across the board.
Instead, Marvel and Sony will be working together on the character in a new partnership that has Marvel guiding the birth of a new big-screen incarnation of Peter Parker for Sony, while gaining the rights to use the same actor and character in Marvel Studios' own movies.
We know very little about what the new movie will look like, aside from it not being an origin story. The title star has yet to be cast, though Sony has set Drew Goddard as its writer and director. That's a savvy move, as Goddard is a major fan favorite in the geek world, having worked on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Alias, Lost, created Netflix's Daredevil and directed Cabin in the Woods.
The current plan is to release a new Spider-Man movie in July of 2017, following Spidey's debut in next year's Captain America: Civil War, and to be followed by some seven "connected universe" movies like Venom, Kraven, and Spider-Man 2099.
Bleeding Cool is reporting today that it's heard from a certain comic book retailer that some noteworthy folks at Sony have been shopping in his store lately, buying Spider-Man comics and graphic novels. Not terribly surprising, as most Marvel-related movies draw ideas and inspiration from Marvel's long publication history.
What's interesting about the report is that Bleeding Cool's source is claiming that all of the comics these Sony bigwigs have been buying are about Spider-Man's trips to the Savage Land. The Savage Land is a sort of prehistoric region in Antarctica where Dinosaurs still live and nature is watched over by a heroic Tarzan-a-like named Ka-Zar. This is consistent with the site's earlier report on some leaked Sony emails pointing towards Goddard wanting to use the Savage Land in a Sinister Six movie.
Specifically, Sony has shown particular interest in Sensational Spider-Man #13-15 (1996), an arc also known as "The Savage Land Saga," and Marvel Fanfare #1-4 (1982). Both stories find Spider-Man venturing to Antarctica on some kind of emergency mission involving the entire Savage Land being in danger.
Perhaps most interesting is the story arc from Marvel Fanfare, in which Spider-Man and Angel from the X-Men are zapped by some kind of device belonging to Magneto, which mutates them both into primordial forms, causing Peter to briefly becom a man-sized spider. Is Goddard planning to use this plot device or something similar in his Spider-Movie? There's plenty of dramatic potential there, considering the PTSD Peter might experience afterwards?
Or might Spider-Man travel to the Savage Land and play with dinosaurs? It would certainly be a wild departure from past Spider-Man movies — which very well may be the point.
Stay tuned.
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