Before Sony joined forces with Marvel early this year, the studio was planning on building a Spider-Man cinematic universe. In addition to the Web-Slinger’s main films, there were also spinoffs starring the Sinister Six, Venom, and several female heroes in the works. Now that Spidey is part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, his big screen plans have changed, and while the spinoffs haven’t been shelved, Marvel isn’t interested in making any for the foreseeable future since they have a lot of work to do on this new version of Peter Parker.
Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige told MTV that while it isn’t impossible that the MCU could feature Spider-Man spinoffs, right now the focus is on fleshing out Spidey in his own movies. Feige said:
Well, there could be [spin-offs]. But the truth is, our job right now is that single Spider-Man movie based in the MCU. And that’s where all our focus is.
When the Sony/Marvel deal was announced in February, it was clarified shortly thereafter that, unlike the Amazing Spider-Man series itself, the spinoffs hadn’t been outright cancelled, but simply delayed indefinitely. However, taking Feige’s statement into account, it will be a long time before any of these projects see the light of day, if at all. Marvel and Sony likely want to wait on expanding Spidey’s personal world until after he’s starred in a trilogy of films (or more). Then maybe they’ll look at Sinister Six and the other scripts to see if they can be adapted for the MCU, but that’s not a guarantee.
Despite Feige’s statement, there is at least one spinoff idea that Feige finds a fascinating concept: Spider-Gwen, who, in the comics, is a Gwen Stacy from another universe who was bitten by the radioactive spider instead of Peter Parker and became Spider-Girl. Earlier this week, Vulture posted their fan trailer of Emma Stone starring in a Spider-Gwen movie (which you can see below), and presumably after watching the mashup, Feige said Spider-Gwen sounded “cool.” Although Stone’s time with Spider-Man is done, maybe a decade from now, after Peter Parker has been well established, another actress could play the superheroine in her own film, or at least costar alongside Spidey.
Spinoffs may not be in the cards right now, but moviegoers will be seeing plenty of Spider-Man in the coming years. Tom Holland will debut as the new Wall-Crawler next year in Captain America: Civil War, and his solo film will swing into theaters on July 28, 2017.
