http://411mania.com/movies/is-venom-spin-off-dead-at-sony/

The rumors continue to heat up with regards to the fate of the Spider-Man movie franchise at Sony Pictures. A new report from Badass Digest claims that Sony’s planned Venom spinoff film is “functionally dead.” Keep in mind that this is only a rumor, and the Badass Digest only claims that this is what they “heard” so take the news with a grain of salt.

Earlier, there were reported talks of Sony considering to make a “soft reboot” of the Spider-Man franchise and even to possibly recast Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker. As of now, The Sinister Six spinoff film is scheduled for a November 2016 release. The Amazing Spider-Man 3 is scheduled for a release in 2018.

It will be interesting to see what direction Sony goes in. One obvious problem is that the Sinister Six is a group of villains and was established as a group for Spider-Man to fight. Venom was also originally established as a Spider-Man villain. How can a Venom movie happen without Spider-Man, the symbiote, and Peter Parker’s connection to it? Wouldn’t a Spider-Man movie featuring an introduction for the symbiote, Eddie Brock, and perhaps even Venom have to happen first? Same thing with a Sinister Six film. Will audiences and kids really be up for a film of villainous antiheroes that want to kill Spider-Man that does not have Spider-Man in it?

The Spider-Man film franchise is already in a serious decline. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was the lowest-grossing movie of the entire franchise and received even worse reviews than Spider-Man 3. A film featuring the Sinister Six, featuring six distinct villains, would not be done without a massive budget and would apparently not feature Spider-Man.

If Sony execs are at crossroads with the direction on where to take the franhicse, the studio will have to make some hard decisions soon.