The Marvelous Story of the Canceled Spider-Man 4 Movie

Original Spider-Man trilogy, is of great importance for comic book movies. Because the first Spider-Man movie, released in 2002, was the first to prove that comic book movies are not a box office hit. The incredible success it achieved caused huge budgets to be allocated for the sequels of the series. Even released in 2007 Spider-Man 3 was the most expensive movie of its time. Yes, it had overtaken giants like the Titanic and the Pirates of the Caribbean.

Despite having the highest grossing $900 million among other movies, Spider-Man 3 discredited the series. Of course, things did not end here, after the third movie, there would be a fourth.

Director Sam Raimi’s word went unheeded:

As it is known, Spider-Man 3 was a complete mess of villains and there was only one reason behind it. Sam Raimi, who directed the entire trilogy, did not want 3 villains, which was actually the last movie. He would only feature Harry Osborn to end his side story and Sandman as the main villain. I mean, they wouldn’t be spending a big ball like Venom on a movie, and there wouldn’t be that black costume or anything.

Then producer Avi Arad told Sam Raimi that if he wanted fans to love his movie, he had to put their favorite character in the movie. With this character he meant, of course, Venom. Since Avi Arad owns the money, Raimi has no choice. The studio kept pushing Raimi harder and harder, and they finally came to an agreement that would make both parties ‘happy’:

Including the two villains in Raimi’s mind, the third villain came into the movie: Venom.

However, the Sandman, Venom and Harry Osborn trio could not create the desired effect and Spider-Man 3, IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes almost crawled on sites like. Many fans disliked the production and were disappointed.

This destruction prevented it from turning into the Spider-Man 4 scenario, which you will soon read with its original drawings…

Spider-Man 4 build phase:

Yes, Mysterio next to you.

You can all guess that Raimi didn’t like the 3rd production and wanted to make the fourth one the best. It was even said that Raimi wanted to make a new trilogy that reached up to the 6th movie, but the famous director denied them. He just wanted to make the best Spider-Man movie he could make under his deal with Sony. He was obsessed man…

As production of Spider-Man 4 progressed, Sony began to think it would be better to reshoot with a new actor. Raimi continued to work. He hired James Vanderbilt for the script for Spider-Man 4. After that, artist Jeffrey Henderson was hired to create the storyboards and even shared some scenes he drew from the script.

Actors like Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst were ready to return. During Spider-Man 3, Raimi wanted the Vulture character in his movie with Ben Kingsley, but the studio wasn’t too keen on it. Raimi didn’t just have one bad guy in mind, he also had his eye on Anne Hathaway.

Raimi would include Anne Hathaway as Felicia Hardy, aka Black Cat:

In fact, according to Jeffrey Henderson’s drawings, we would see Mysterio at the beginning of the movie. Mysterio would be played by Bruce Campbell, Raimi’s very close friend and appearing in nearly every Spider-Man movie.

Spider-Man 4 story:

The information on this topic usually consists of rumors, somewhat official statements, and storyboards. The available information only talks about the opening scene of the movie and a fight scene. Raimi said that the movie will begin with Spider-Man capturing the side characters who are not the main villain. These would include Mysterio, Shocker, Prowler, Rhino, and Still-Man.

After all these snack villains, our main villain Vulture would take the stage. Raimi wanted Vulture differently than he did in the comics, as children of this generation would only remember him as an old grandpa in green tights. That’s why he had it designed more mechanical and robotic, just like in Spider-Man: Homecoming.

Peter was trying to defeat Vulture using the environment. Then Vulture would shoot razor feathers from its wings, inflicting serious damage on Spider-Man. Then Black Cat was saving Spider-Man. Unfortunately, the information about Spider-Man 4, which was never filmed, is just that. All storyboards drawn by Jeffrey Henderson from here You can review.

The giver blows the whistle, but does not know how to whistle:

Raimi had hired enough staff to keep the project going and everything seemed fine. However, since Raimi had been working on the Spider-Man series for almost 10 years, he was now exhausted and started to give up with the pressure of the studio.

Apparently, the studio wanted the Lizard character, Curt Connors, and was trying to convince Raimi of it, but he was fed up with it. The studio continued to try to instill in Raimi the idea of ​​a reboot with a new cast.

Raimi said ‘enough is enough’, the script was not going as he wanted and Sony insisted on reshooting. Raimi’s statements about the events are as follows:

“I was very unhappy with Spider-Man 3 and wanted to make Spider-Man 4 at its best, it had to be the best Spider-Man movie. But I couldn’t put the script together in time because of my mistakes, and I told Sony, ‘I don’t want to make a movie that isn’t great, so we shouldn’t make it. I said, ‘You go and remake the movie with the new cast, you always wanted that’. Amy Pascal, one of Sony’s vice presidents, said to me, ‘Thank you. We really appreciate you not wasting the studio’s money and time.”

Then, James Vanderbilt, whom Raimi hired to write Spider-Man 4, was hired by Sony for the upcoming Spider-Man movie. As soon as Raimi canceled the project, Sony announced to the public that Spider-Man would come in a remake.

As we understand from the story, Raimi is a very patient and well-intentioned person, while Sony is a production company that does not listen to the directors. We don’t know how wise it would be to cast aside the original Spider-Man, the hero of a generation, and Tobey Maguire, who portrayed him, and bring Andrew Garfield, who was deemed unfit by many, to the role. One thing is for sure, everyone will want to see Tobey as Spider-Man at least once more.