So many recent superhero TV conversations have been wrapped around Disney's impending Fox takeover (which has a date now) and what that will mean for the MCU. But if your Spidey-sense started tingling maddeningly this week, it's probably because Sony is planning to further capitalize on Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse's popularity by rolling out a slate of new TV projects all set within the Spider-Verse. Seems like a good time to bring up quotes about great responsibilities.
Sony Pictures Entertainment chairman Tony Vinciquerra is looking to the studio's rich intellectual properties for inspiration, and few characters stand out quite as overtly as Spider-Man. Speaking with Variety, Vinciquerra laid out the company's eight-legged plans for the slightly distant future.
We have the next seven or eight years laid out as to what we’re going to do with that asset, and that will not only be on the film side — it’ll be on the TV side. Our television group will have its own set of characters from within that universe that we will seek to develop.
The first thing to take away from Tony Vinciquerra's reveal is that he's not specifically naming Spider-Man as one of the characters who would get a standalone TV show. Granted, the officially titled Sony's Universe of Marvel Characters has many hundreds of potential characters at play, with many Spider-faves in that group. So perhaps confirming a proper Spider-Man TV show would have just overshadowed the promise of other characters getting their own series.
In any case, this idea isn't one that Sony's execs just stumbled upon yesterday or anything. According to Sony Pictures Television chairman Mike Hopkins, who had previously worked at Fox and Hulu, the creative team is "pretty far down the road" when it comes to deciding on the characters that deserve to get their own TV spotlights.
Naturally, no one is getting specific with any names outside of Spider-Man's, either. And no details about formats were shared, either. So we could feasibly be getting a fantastically surreal live-action Spider-Gwen TV show, a dark animated series about Mephisto, and a gritty crime drama centered on Black Cat. The options aren't exactly infinite, but they're plentiful enough to feel that way.
Just think about it. With fan-favorite prequels like Gotham, Smallville and others offering up storylines that don't hinge entirely on the superheroes in question, Sony can do almost anything with its Spider-verse characters. Maybe there's a TV show in the future that would focus on Peter Parker's parents, Richard and Mary Parker. Or a Dallas-esque drama about the Osborn family's trials and tribulations. The list goes on.
What's more, Mike Hopkins teases that as it goes with some projects in Marvel's cinematic and TV projects, the goal for Sony's push into Spider-television is to create a crossover-friendly universe. In his words:
I think we aspire to have several shows in a universe that we create that can pollinate between each other, and to [be] working with a partner to make that happen.
No word on where these projects are looking to get set up, and Sony doesn't really have any specific networks that would be automatically expected to team with the studio on a variety of Spider-Man-related TV shows. That said, it's easy to imagine that just about any network out there with a worthwhile programming budget would be leaping at the chance to create original content for one of the most popular superheroes of all time.
Will any of these potential TV shows tie in with the upcoming feature films Spider-Man: Far From Home or Avengers: Endgame? Probably not directly, since they'll likely show up well after both of those films have hit theaters. (And well after the current midseason TV schedule.) But it's still worth talking about obsessively, isn't it?
No details are set yet for any Spider-Man TV shows, but stay tuned to CinemaBlend for when those future announcements are made.
