Sony Pictures has reportedly canceled its Spider-Woman film project led by director Olivia Wilde. The decision follows a series of box office disappointments in the studio’s Spider-Man spin-off slate. Industry reporter Daniel Richtman confirmed the project’s termination. This comes on the heels of reports that Sony has halted any further Spider-Man spin-offs after Kraven the Hunter failed commercially.
Sony first announced Wilde’s involvement in 2020, but development stalled when the studio prioritized Madame Web. That release centered on Julia Cornwall, Anya Corazon, and Mattie Franklin, all past holders of Spider-Girl or Spider-Woman titles from Marvel comics. The film featured an odd link to Peter Parker’s beginnings, showing his pregnant mother, Mary Parker played by Emma Roberts, and future Uncle Ben played by Adam Scott. Those moments teased Peter’s birth and the Spider-Verse but led to nothing connected. It’s moments like that, where Sony teases elements of the Peter Parker Spider-Man interacting with these spin-offs, that fans have come to label Sony’s efforts the “Spider-Man-less Spider-Verse.”
For example, while the main films have all existed apart from Tom Holland’s Spider-Man character, a post-credits in Morbius brought Michael Keaton’s Vulture into play via a multiverse shift from Spider-Man: No Way Home. Viewers noted that it was weird that Vulture wanted to join Morbius in a fight against a hero who didn’t seem to exist in that universe. Even the Morbius trailer seemed to reference Spider-Man, who of course appears no where in the movie.
Tom Hardy’s Venom also entered the Marvel Cinematic Universe briefly through Venom: Let There Be Carnage where they watched a television report about Spider-Man and Peter Parker, and Venom expressed excitement over finally meeting Spider-Man. The only follow-up to that was in the mid-credits scene of Spider-Man: No Way Home, when a mysterious force pulled Venom back to his home universe through a portal, but as he departed, a small piece of the symbiote dropped onto the bar counter. Still, like the standalone movies, each of those entries stayed separate from Tom Holland’s MCU related storyline.
Sony also reportedly refused to license Kraven the Hunter for Marvel’s Black Panther, and up until 2021, the studio guarded Venom (its only successful spin-off) until Marvel forced the post-credtis scene crossovers. Sony is now reportedly permitting greater access to its Marvel holdings for Marvel Studios projects. Since Jessica Drew links closely to S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers in source material, who knows what might happen with the character. And could an MCU version of Venom appear in the Spider-Man: Brand New Day trilogy? Don’t hold your breath.
Back in 2022, it looked like Olivia Wilde was poised to bring Spider-Woman to the Sony slate, and had been praising the power of female directors during an appearance on the Shut Up Evan podcast, where she said:
“Look, we are seeing this incredible influx of female directors and storytellers getting to take hold of this genre, of the superhero space, and infuse it with their own perspective. So, not only do I get to tell this story as a director, but I get to develop this story, and that was what made it so incredible for me.”
“I’m just honored to be amongst this wave of women who are showing up and saying, ‘We are not only going to step in and try and tell this story like men do, we’re actually going to reframe the stories themselves.’ And the industry is, as far as I can tell, really supportive of that. There is a sea change and it’s because of these decades of trailblazers who demanded this over and over and over again and it’s finally broken through and I’m very fortunate to be there with it.”
But alas, it looks like her opportunity has now been lost due to Sony’s own missteps. And if what she was saying was true, Marvel fans are the better for it. Sounds like there’s very little chance it would have been any better than Madame Web any way.
The First Appearances and Origin of Spider Woman
Now that Sony has botched things, Marvel Studios appears ready to integrate a few of Sony’s key figures into its established framework. Let’s see what happens.
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