Thanks to a report in The Wrap, we now know what most fans have long suspected. The upcoming Kraven the Hunter is the last entry, at least for now, of Sony’s “Spider-Man Cinematic Universe.” Of course, Kraven the Hunter could surprise everyone and make a billion dollars. But if it flops, as the tracking suggests, it seems Sony is putting a fork in this ill-conceived cinematic universe. According to the report, Sony is going back to focusing on Spider-Man movies alone, and the animated Spider-Verse films. And for now, that’s it. Here’s what an unknown Sony representative told The Wrap:
Sometimes that lack of quality meets a movie no one asked for, which was the case with Madame Web, and that is a no-win scenario. It may be time for Sony to start cultivating different IP to launch new franchises.
There are a lot of reasons why Sony’s Spider-Man Universe, or SSU, failed. Chief among them, the movies have not been exactly stellar. And that’s us being nice about it. Morbius and Madame Web crashed spectacularly at the box office, and became jokey internet memes. But bad movies make money all the time, especially the ones starring superheroes. So why not Sony’s? What made Sony’s Spider-Man universe such a disaster?
Well, you can’t have an “SSU” if there’s no Spider-Man actually in it. And that’s exactly what they did. For legal reasons, mainly Marvel Studios’ involvement with the actual Sony Spidey films, Sony couldn’t use the Tom Holland Peter Parker in their non-MCU films. So characters whose only existence in the comics centered on interacting with Spider-Man, like Kraven and Madame Web, couldn’t do that on screen. So it all seemed pointless. Even without being connected to the actual Spider-Man films, you’d think the existing films like Morbius and Venom would be connected to one other. But that didn’t really happen either.
Of course, Venom was a surprise success, leading Sony to believe they could do the same trick with other Spidey villains and supporting cast. True, Venom as a character may have started as a Spidey villain. But for the past 30 years, Venom has been a successful solo antihero. You can’t say the same for Kraven, a character that exists entirely as an antagonist for Spider-Man. This is something that clearly no one at the top at Sony was aware of. (This is where it helps to have a Kevin Feige in charge.) We just hope when the dust settles, and the SSU smoke clears, Sony will use characters like Kraven and Morbius in their original capacity—as Spider-Man villains in Spider-Man movies.