Spiderman may be out of the MCU- Disney vs Sony, fight

[mr friendly guy]

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2019/08/ ... -standoff/

Spider-Man is out of the MCU thanks to Sony/Disney standoff
The two studios failed to negotiate new terms giving Disney future co-financing stake.
JENNIFER OUELLETTE - 8/21/2019, 6:17 AM

Deadline Hollywood reports that future blockbuster films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe will likely be missing a key figure: Spider-Man. Apparently, Sony Pictures and Disney/Marvel have failed to reach new terms for the franchise acceptable to both parties. That means Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige will not be a producer on the two more Spider-Man movies reportedly in the works.

It's kind of shocking news, given that this summer's Spider-Man: Far From Home seemed to be setting up young Peter Parker (Tom Holland) as a worthy successor to Tony Stark's Iron Man in future MCU films. But there were hints: Marvel didn't announce any new Spider-Man films at San Diego Comic Con this year—although the studio did reveal a whole slew of projects in development for the next phase of the MCU, now that the original Avengers multi-film storyline has come to a fitting close with Endgame.

So what happened? It's all about money, of course. Under the current arrangement, Disney holds the merchandising rights and gets 5% of first-dollar gross (how much a film makes at the box office on its first day of release), according to Deadline. Sony holds the distribution and screen rights to Spider-Man solo films, starting with Sam Raimi's 2002 Spider-Man with Tobey Maguire. Disney was pushing for a 50/50 co-financing agreement going forward, which Sony turned down flat. Nobody backed down, and so here we are.

This is honestly a head-scratching move on Sony's part, given the key role Feige played in successfully rebooting the Spider-Man franchise with Holland in the title role. Granted, it's understandable that the studio wouldn't want to give up so much of its stake in its most successful (and profitable) franchise. Spider-Man: Far From Home was the studio's highest-grossing film ever. But as Deadline Hollywood points out, it's a bit like saying one can win the NBA Championship without Michael Jordan:

Feige's first decade at Marvel is largely unblemished, and his consistency has been nothing short of historic: even George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, and Peter Jackson haven't seen everything turn into a hit, and so maybe only James Cameron has the success record that Feige has achieved. But Feige has done it all in the last 10 years, producing and overseeing 23 superheroes, with not a flop in the bunch. They've all been number-one openers that have collectively grossed $26.8 billion. Feige this year became the producer of the top-grossing film ever for two studios—Sony and Disney—and he produced three of the top-four highest-grossing films this year in Avengers: Endgame, Captain Marvel and Spider-Man: Far From Home. This after scoring the first-ever Best Picture Oscar nom for a superhero film last year with Black Panther. I ca't think of a Hollywood producer/executive who has done anything close to this.

That said, Sony produced the Oscar-winning Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse independent of Disney, so maybe it's a good business decision after all. Tom Holland and director Jon Watts are still signed on for future Spider-Man movies, among other projects. And Disney/Marvel has all those new projects for the next phase of the MCU in the works. As for Feige, he's taking on the X-Men universe, including Deadpool, on top of everything else in the wake of the 20th Century Fox acquisition. So he'll have his hands full. The only real losers here are MCU fans, who will miss seeing their favorite webslinger mixing it up with the surviving Avengers and other characters going forward.

Grace Randolph gave a good analysis which I will link. However if you don't want to watch a video, I linked the first article I could find.

[The Romulan Republic]

Well, that's a crock of corporate shit.

[Gandalf]

"Hey Marvel, thanks for making our property worth a fuckton again. Come back when you want to pay more." - Sony

[mr friendly guy]

Well, that's a crock of corporate shit.

I never paid much attention to corporate sheenanigans until I discovered YT channels like Grace Randolph's and a few other "opinion" channels which might be bordering on rumour mongering, but at least do provide some evidence to back up their claims. It just opens your eyes on what goes on behind the camera.

[The Romulan Republic]

Honestly, I'm pretty much ready to just say the MCU for me ended with Infinity War (first third of Endgame or so is okay, but then it went off the rails a bit- everything prior to the time travel could serve as an epilogue to the MCU, with it ending with Tony saying "no" because he'd rather keep the life he has than risk it all trying to undo the past).

[FireNexus]

"Hey Marvel, thanks for making our property worth a fuckton again. Come back when you want to pay more." - Sony

I wonder how much they’d charge for just giving up the rights. Like, if I were Disney I’d be willing to pay them 50% of the gross for a decade and 10% basically forever with $1B up front. Just to have the rights again. Like, they’ll prob own Sony in ten years or so anyway.

[Majin Gojira]

Sony's stocks fell in the wake of this. On one hand, Disney doesn't really need more money, but on the other, Sony has no real room to argue much.

[Solauren]

Fox had the X-men rights, and wouldn't return them.
Disney simply bought Fox.

Sony is only worth about 35billion (probably less after the stock dive). Disney could afford that.

[Gandalf]

"Hey Marvel, thanks for making our property worth a fuckton again. Come back when you want to pay more." - Sony

I wonder how much they’d charge for just giving up the rights. Like, if I were Disney I’d be willing to pay them 50% of the gross for a decade and 10% basically forever with $1B up front. Just to have the rights again. Like, they’ll prob own Sony in ten years or so anyway.

While Sony might like an "in perpetuity" agreement, Disney has no real incentive to do so, as sooner or later the total money given to Sony would be greater than a massive one off purchase now.

In the meantime, if Sony actually hired a decent lot of people, they could make their own Spiderman films and be competition for Marvel.

[FaxModem1]

The Hard Times

Marvel Allowed Weekend and Holiday Visitation With Tom Holland

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BY ZACH RAFFIO | AUGUST 20, 2019

LOS ANGELES — In a controversial move, Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios announced today the termination of their contract allowing the Spider-Man character to remain within the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The terms of their deal do, however, permit Marvel weekend and certain holiday visitation with Spider-Man star Tom Holland, sources confirm.

“We’ve raised the boy, so we deserve to be a part of his life,” Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige said, according to those familiar with the situation. “This change is going to be hard enough for Tom and he shouldn’t have all communication with us cut off. I’m happy we were able to arrange weekends and holidays, and hope that things can remain civil moving forward — for his sake.”

“I was hoping we could weekends, holidays, and television, but maybe after working on our relationship for a few years, we can work that out too.”

Executives from both Sony and Marvel were seen leaving the Stanley Mosk Courthouse in Los Angeles at around 1:30 p.m. today, with members of Marvel’s team in tears as they watched Sony Chairman Tim Rothman drag Holland by the arm, with the 23-year old actor holding on tightly to his teddy bear and asking why “Kevvy” was so sad.

“We are doing what’s best for Tom,” claimed Rothman, buckling Holland into the backseat of his 2017 Toyota Sienna. “He may not realize it now, but one day he’s going to thank us,” he added before lighting up a cigarette and speeding out of the lot.

Judge Benjamin Rose provided his comments on the proceedings.

“You never want to see such a tight-knit corporate relationship fall apart,” he noted. “You always hope they’ll work it out, and that receiving millions of dollars in merchandise benefits would be enough for one mega corporation to sustain, but I guess human nature takes over. I pray for all parties involved.”

At press time, Sony CEO Anthony Vinciquerra was seen preparing Holland a box of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese, but not quite how the actor likes it, causing him to throw a fit which resulted in the grown man crying on the kitchen floor, saying he felt far from home.

[Ziggy Stardust]

Tom Holland must be pissed. I mean, he went from being Tony Stark's heir apparent in the next phase of the MCU to a potential scenario of being the next Andrew Garfield.

[PREDATOR490]

The simple outcome is Disney just bites the bullet and does a straight out hostile buy takeover of Sony. Nothing would really stop them except potential PR fallouts. The reality is that Disney is already establishing a serious monopoly and if they throw around that weight too much the backlash could cost them dearly.

This goes beyond the simple movies and into the real world aspects of what is going on. Fans and viewers may be thinking about wanting to see good movies with the characters they like but if it comes at the cost of Disney establishing a total monopoly that literally ends up dominating the entire industry I would think that is a really bad thing..

I can see this ending in Disney buying out Sony
OR
Disney lets Sony off in the hopes that Sony will naturally end up 'suffering' much worse from the break up.

At the end of the day, Sony comes away with a valuable character but that value has been aided by the MCU. If Sony want to take back their Spiderman they are going to effectively need to hose Tom Holland and everything with another reboot. Even if fans accepted that and the new Spiderman was good. It is still going to be going toe-to-toe with the Disney MCU which is simply a juggernaut at this point.

DC has tried to play in this game and failed miserably, Universal tried to play and failed. At this point if Sony wants to make the big bucks they did then they have to get in on that MCU.

Ultimately, this is going to be an interesting game of chicken / who breaks first. Sony can try and hold Spiderman hostage but it will cost them either getting completely bought out or Disney leaving them to pick up the pieces of making their own Spiderman that will forever be compared to the MCU.

[Elheru Aran]

Yeah, Disney really has lost nothing but one hero, which may or may not damage their plans for the future of the MCU to some extent but they can adapt as needed; the MCU still has enough staying power right now to reliably produce a few more blockbusters. Thor 4, Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain Marvel, and so forth. Sony on the other hand, what does Sony have? Spiderman and... what... maybe Fantastic Four?

*Googles*

Well. They have the rights to nearly 900 Marvel characters.

The catch? Many, if not most, of those are minor characters. Black Cat, Silver Sable, most of Spidey's rogues' gallery. Not exactly household names. Could they make movies about them? Sure. They're apparently going to make a Black Cat movie, and are making a Morbius the Living Vampire movie with Jared Leto (of all people). But are those movies going to be big and successful enough to compete with Disney's MCU? Good question.

So ultimately this is a bigger gamble on Sony's part than Disney's. If Sony can pull off making a few decent movies with its stable of heroes, they might have enough bargaining power to tip their scales. If not? Disney doesn't have to care. So it can't use a few heroes, it's got plenty enough else to play with.

[PREDATOR490]

Disney has plenty of time. Spiderman is not required for a lot of the upcoming projects and could easily be sidelined if they want to 'leave the door open' without it hurting the MCU overall.
Alternatively, Spiderman 'dies' and / or gets screwed in a off-screen writers fiat to explain him vanishing.

Hell, Disney could double tap this by using whatever means of temporal / mind wipe / reality shifting shit to erase Spiderman to bring in whatever else they want... X-Men.

Sony is going to be swallowing an extremely bitter pill since the MCU can easily pump out enough projects and material to see them through decades of films without even a backward glance at Spiderman missing.
Sony only has Spiderman and whatever bit pieces they can cobble together. Even if they manage a success, it is going to take nothing less than repeated awesome success for as long as Marvel keeps pumping out their content to matter.
Otherwise, Sony puts out a few wonders but eventually fades into obscurity compared to Marvel. If DC cannot compete with Marvel with the characters they have in the berths, it seems very unlikely that Sony can sustain their own universe with a single one trick wonder pony.

I can see Disney happily playing out their own projects and watch Sony ultimately wither until they collapse and sell Spiderman or Disney straight out gobbles them up.

[Solauren]

Sony also needs to consider their cost/profit ratio.

MCU movies seem to make 10 times their production cost in profit at the box office. Add on sales of toys, videos, etc....
Song's movies have been roughly 3 times their production cost. But the thing is, they cost more to make.

Think about it. Sony is spending more money to make the movies then Disney, and making less per dollar.

Song needs to come to terms with Disney, even if it means just saying 'give us 1.5billion and you can have all your characters back'.

[PREDATOR490]

From the cost / profit perspective, letting Spiderman go might actually be beneficial for Disney.

They have multiple projects across the MCU in the works that could easily see any need for Spiderman showing up being in 2+ years. Spending billions to get a character back that you have no use for while coming off the 'high' point could come across as being less effective.

If Disney play with the rest of their toys then Spiderman will eventually come down off the high point leave to a potential better acquisition later. Sony can try to continue with Tom Holland which noone is really going to be happy with and cause massive problems. Alternatively, Sony does the reboot which will again, cause a backlash and fans not accepting it.

Disney ultimately gets to walk away clean because it was not THEM that 'ruined' Spiderman with another reboot or turned things to shit. If Spiderman is acquired later, they can retcon 'MCU' Spiderman back into their world while coming across as being the 'Good Guys'

As it stands, people are throwing around numbers like 7 Billion for Sony selling Spiderman back to Marvel. It is insane but such a number is actually not that unreasonable at this point. If Sony pull that kind of number out Disney ultimately have to decide if throwing that money on a character they can easily do without is going to return more than just letting it slide and playing the longer game.

The endgame scenario is Disney waiting until Sony is in a weaker position so they can go in for the kill by buying them. That way they can cut the bullshit and get EVERYTHING rather than the long drawn out issue of having to deal or piece meal things like Spiderman / Venom etc.

From a corporate / business perspective this should be interesting to watch and might even be the kind of thing that blows up into something truly spectacular for good or bad.

[mr friendly guy]

From what I understand, Disney wanted to change the deal and Sony didn't budge.

Now I would have preferred Spiderman goes back to Marvel and ultimately Disney, since Marvel most probably could do a better job than Sony. I also disliked the terms where Sony keeps Spiderman forever as long as they turn out some Spidey movies once in a while. It was a deal they got while Marvel was in the financial shitter during the 1990s.

However a deal is a deal and Disney should just buy out Sony if it means that much to them. However as people have noted, Disney can print $$$$ without Spiderman, so why go for the deal? So as it stands, I am going to lean towards Sony as the side that seems less at fault here.

Now I have seen other people take Sony's side, partly because it appears Disney wants to change the deal, and partly because they hate Disney due to what they perceive as Disney making pop culture to appease SJWs, sorry I mean going woke (no I am not kidding on that).

I should also point out, Sony had a surprise hit with Venom and we still need to see how well they do with Morbius, a character who the average non comic book fan hasn't heard of. But ultimately, they are playing with a weaker hand than Disney.

[Solauren]

The question is, what other copyrights/franchises does Song own or have an interest in that Disney would want to make it worth buying them up, beyond Spiderman + co?

A quick look in Wikipedia shows...

Jumanji
James Bond
Men in Black
Hotel Transylvania

They also own Columbia, TriStar, Screen Gems and there associated properties.

Yeah, buying up Sony's film division would be a good move. Less for Netflix to show, more for their own network.

[The Romulan Republic]

Fox had the X-men rights, and wouldn't return them.
Disney simply bought Fox.

Sony is only worth about 35billion (probably less after the stock dive). Disney could afford that.

I mean, our anti-monopoly laws are already kind of a joke, so...

[mr friendly guy]

And due to Disney magic, Spidey is back in the MCU

https://www.theverge.com/2019/9/27/2088 ... evin-feige

Spider-Man returns to the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Sony and Disney strike a new deal
72
Marvel Studios chief Kevin Feige has his powerful icon back

By Julia Alexander Sep 27, 2019, 11:26am EDT
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Sony Pictures and Marvel Studios will make a third Spider-Man movie together after all. Sony and Disney have struck a new deal over Spider-Man, which would let the web-slinging hero return to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

“I am thrilled that Spidey’s journey in the MCU will continue, and I and all of us at Marvel Studios are very excited that we get to keep working on it,” says Marvel Studios co-president Kevin Feige, according to Variety. “Spider-Man is a powerful icon and hero whose story crosses all ages and audiences around the globe. He also happens to be the only hero with the superpower to cross cinematic universes, so as Sony continues to develop their own Spidey-verse, you never know what surprises the future might hold.”

The two studios previously announced this summer that Spider-Man would leave the Marvel Cinematic Universe after the companies couldn’t agree on a new financing deal. Disney wanted a 50/50 cut on all revenue made via Spider-Man films, instead of its previous deal, which included 5 percent from the first dollar gross and merchandising revenue. The separation meant Feige would no longer oversee the Spider-Man films, which fall under Sony’s banner.

Tom Holland’s web-slinging superhero would instead exist solely in Sony’s new Spider-Man universe, which also includes other characters like Venom. The inability to reach a new deal also prevented Holland’s Spider-Man from appearing in any more Marvel Studios movies, which is a significant loss to the studio, given how key the character has been in recent MCU movies. Under the new deal, “Sony is believed to have proposed keeping the arrangement under the current terms,” according to Variety.

The loss of Spider-Man to the MCU was also a deep blow to fans, who campaigned on Twitter to bring the hero back to Marvel’s universe. “It’s been a crazy week, and I love you all from the bottom of my heart, and I love you 3000,” Holland said at Disney’s biennial D23 fan convention in August, referencing a line from Avengers: Endgame that’s become a widespread meme.

The next Spider-Man movie — the third in Sony’s Homecoming trilogy — is set to be released on July 16th, 2021.

From what I am hearing, Sony accepted Disney's original offer, so if true, 1-0 to Disney.

[PREDATOR490]

Disney really has the leverage in this scenario so it is hardly surprising that Sony would give in.

I do expect that Sony is going to start really pushing to expand the Spider-verse to a state where they can get some of the power back to either keep Disney from trying this again later or as an eventual push to separate on a stronger foundation.

I fully expect that Disney will try this again and / or try to do a hostile takeover of Sony.

[Solauren]

Given Disney's current expansion plans (their own streaming service), a acquisition of the Song's film division is probably on their radar now.

I kind of picture the discussion like a mob boss meeting.

Donald 'the Duck': "Mickey, these Sony boys, they got lots of films, but won't share them. They're cutting into your territory."
Mickey 'the mouse': "Really? Let's send Goofy, Pluto, and the rest of them over to convince them to sell out to us" (high pitched giggling)

[Highlord Laan]

Yeah, any entertainment company trying to play hardball with the House of Mouse is going to lose, and lose hard. I really don't want to see Disney become even more pervasive than it already is, but if Sony is going to make itself a target, I really can't blame Micky for what he does.

[Enigma]

Rumors are swirling that Apple and Amazon are interesting in buying out Sony.
If that is true, supposedly the rights to Spiderman goes back to Marvel if Sony gets bought out.

[Themightytom]

Two universes? That brings up a question for me. Did the Hulk snap create a new time line? Up until that point, Thanos wins anyway, assuming the stones are put back Exactly right, all that ends up happening is that the stones were borrowed to the future, used to bring everyone back to life... Same time line.

Up until Hulk brings back all the missing heroes of course, and they help defeat the Thanos from the past after he travelled to the future?? So now the past is missing it's Thanos, and his armies and it's Nebula and Gamorra for that matter, since past Nebula died and past Gamorra didn't seem to go back to the past, Plus that time line has a missing Loki.

So that timeline had the avengers, and a Stark and uh.. most of what made up Peter's back story?? So could be Sony's Spiderman verse, but is, I guess a lot less eventful, because Thanos isn't looking for the stones, so the Guardians never get together, the Avengers don't necessarily stay together, the snap never happens, etc?

https://bgr.com/2019/10/02/avengers-5-v ... er-parker/