Breaking Down the Sony/Marvel Studios Spider-Man Deal—And What Went Wrong

Image via Marvel / Sony

While it’s difficult to imagine now, there was a point in time in which Marvel almost ceased to exist, and that history wasn’t so long ago: In 1996, Marvel was absolutely strapped for cash; barely afloat after a bevy of bad investments, and the bursting of comic book publishing bubble, the company was looking for any possible way to continue to stay afloat—which included the leveraging of the film rights to their characters. The plan was to sell the rights to get enough cash to keep going, and then rake in the money of merchandise and comic book sales once the films were released. Fox stepped in, purchasing the movie rights to the X-Men and Fantastic Four characters. After years of litigation (in a story that’s absolutely worth a Wikipedia deep-dive), Sony ended up with the rights to Spider-Man in 1999. That lead to the Sam Raimi-directed Spider-Man trilogy of films, which started in 2002 and ended in 2007.

Under the terms of the deal, Sony had to produce a new Spider-Man movie every couple of years in order to retain the rights. Keen to hold onto a viable cash cow, Sony quickly moved to reboot the franchise, ushering in the 2012, Marc Webb-directed The Amazing Spider-Man. Starring Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone, the film did well for Sony, grossing $757.9 million dollars worldwide (according to Box Office Mojo). However, it was still far under the $890.9 million worldwide gross that Spider-Man 3 saw. Webb and crew tried again, resulting in 2014’s absolutely horrid The Amazing Spider-Man 2, which grossed less than Amazing Spider-Man’s $709 million worldwide. After this, the core Spider-Man franchise was more or less on life support.

So desperate to avoid having the rights revert, Sony kicked around the idea of a few different movie series to keep that sweet, sweet Spidey cash flowing, including: A Sinister Six movie, a Venom movie (which did get made after all!), an all-female webswingers movie (which I’d still like to see!), and—in perhaps the most ill-advised move of all—a [checks notes, still cannot believe this was real] a movie focused entirely on a young version of Aunt May.

It was around this time that the emails from the Sony hack became public and we all learned that Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige and Sony mega-producer Amy Pascal had met about trying to bring the character into the MCU. That initial meeting didn’t go well—Pascal is rumored to have thrown a sandwich at Feige—but that didn’t stop the two studios from eventually reaching an agreement in 2015 to share the character.

Under the terms of this agreement, Sony would continue to pay for and have “final creative control” of any sort of future solo Spider-Man movies—but—Marvel Studios would produce the film and serve as “creative lead”. This meant Kevin Feige and his expert team would have the chance to shape the tone and style, pick the cast, and integrate the character into the larger Marvel Cinematic Universe. Meanwhile, Sony could still develop spinoffs (hello, Venom, hello, Jared Leto-as-Morbius) and animated movies (i.e., Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse). The decision was met with praise from both critics and fans, a shrewd business decision that benefitted all parties.

And it did. Spider-Man: Homecoming’s worldwide gross of $880.2 million outperformed all other Spider-Man movies (save for Spider-Man 3). Meanwhile, Spider-Man: Far From Home just crossed the billion dollar worldwide mark, making it the most successful Spider-Man movie ever. Director Jon Watts breathed new life into a character that had been rebooted a shocking three times in 15 years, while Tom Holland’s performance as the titular character gained tons of acclaim—and was the emotional center of Avengers: Infinity War’s most devastating scene. Everything seemed to be going well.

Which brings us to yesterday’s news. According the Deadline report, Disney and Sony haven’t been able to settle on an agreement—and it’s all come down to money. After the success of Far From Home, it’s said that Disney wants to change the terms of the financing agreement, opting for a 50/50 split. Sony and Disney would go splitsville on funds needed to make the film, as well as sharing the profits of the film 50/50. As it stands now, Marvels receives all profit from merchandise sold and (roughly) a 5% cut of the profits from the box office totals on the film’s first day of release. Sony, specifically senior management team executives Tom Rothman and Tony Vinciquerra, apparently countered that the deal should remain as is, but Disney didn’t want to play ball. There also, reportedly, seems to be some concerns over Feige’s current workload, not only overseeing Phase 4 and the various Disney+ series, but the overall inclusion of the recently acquired Fox properties (X-Men, Fantastic Four) into the MCU. 

What’s interesting here is the amount of hubris from both parties involved. Sony seems content in thinking they’re capable of doing it themselves, getting high on their success of both Venom and Into the Spider-Verse. It’s speculated the studio still has deals with Tom Holland and Jon Watts, and producer Amy Pascal, so a lot of the core talent would still be in place, even without Feige. However, as Deadline is quick to note, Feige is on an absolutely unprecedented run right now. Over the last decade, he’s overseen 23 different movies, all without a single L: Every single Marvel Studios film has opened in first place at the box office, their total combined profit is close to $27 billion dollars (nearly $2 billion of which comes from both these MCU Spider-Man films), and he produced what is now the highest-grossing film in box office history in Avengers: Endgame. There’s no comparison for that right now. It is a Herculean feat, the likes of which we may never see again. And it would absolutely benefit Sony to continue a relationship with someone who has such a deep understanding of what makes each of these characters work. A MCU without Spider-Man, a character that’s been so pivotal and integral over the last few years seems like a pretty bleak situation, especially after getting two truly great movies in a row. Hell, the entire emotional core of Far From Home doesn’t exist without Peter’s compelling relationship with Tony Stark. Furthermore, the ending of that movie launched a new and legitimately exciting future for the character, one that would be great to see come to full fruition under Feige’s tenure.

The Variety piece seems a little more optimistic about the chances of negotiations resuming, while Sony attempted to downplay any reports of animosity in a tweet thread late last night. Conspiracy theorists seem to think this news was floated to outlets in an attempt to garner public’s ire and bring the two parties to an agreement. Regardless of how this plays out, it’s not an understatement to say this feels like a real turning point in the history of Marvel Studios. Are we about to see an Icarus moment? Time will tell.

One parting thought: If Sony does decide they want to try and make it on their own, I’m pretty sure they could call some guys who helped make a really damn good Spider-Man movie last year to help them out. A live action movie with the creative prowess of Into the Spider-Verse? I would like to see it.