Spider-Man 4 Production On Hold Indefinitely?

Published on December 18, 2009 by Craig Sharp · View Comments

spider-man-4 More from the rumour mill today, as news breaks over on IESB that production on Spider-Man 4 has been put on hold – indefinitely. Sony Pictures have denied the rumours, stating that the production is on a planned holiday break and nothing more. However according to their sources, department heads working on the project were notified of the halt last Thursday. The reason? Disagreements between studio and director.

According to their “sources,” director Sam Raimi and studio execs are butting heads over who should be the lead villain in the film, and of course no villain means no finished script. This from IESB:

Spidey and friends have some issues that need to be dealt with before production can move forward once again. Oh, and the film is known as SPIDER-M4N within the production offices so take note! Who wants to be the first to start the trending topic on Twitter #SPIDER-M4N?

An inside source working on the project tells IESB that there are some major issues director Sam Raimi is dealing with that include an incomplete script. And why is the script incomplete? Looks like Raimi and the studio heads at Sony Pictures can’t agree upon a villain for the film.

Raimi is pushing hard for the Vulture to be the big baddie, something he also pushed for in the third film to star alongside the Sandman but didn’t get and we all know how that one turned out. Vulture was to do his evil deeds alongside the new Goblin and Sandman. A single concept art sketch can be seen in “The Art of Spider-Man 3″ book. Vulture and Flint Marko would have been cellmates who escaped together, with Vulture pressuring the more passive Marko into committing crimes.

On the flip side, who does the studio want to be the villain? Our source says they seem to only be interested in featuring which ever character is selling books right now but basically they have no idea, just not the Vulture.

So, production on SPIDER-M4N grinded to a halt this past Thursday and isn’t budging until some compromises are made. Sony is in a bit of a dilemna though because they are insistent upon getting a film shooting as soon as possible. Our source also said these issues aren’t being handled in the most friendliest of fashions. There is apparently some definite anger within the production with several people very “pissed off”.

With Sony currently denying the rumours I’d suggest taking them with a pinch of salt for the time being, however this is another stumbling block for the troubled franchise that Sony could’ve done without. Personally I’d be quite happy if Spider-Man 4 was dead and buried to save us from another lacklustre sequel, sadly when it comes to dollars and cents, they don’t get much bigger than Spider-Man!