Yesterday, Sam Raimi, while expressing his thoughts on directing Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, teased his Spider-Man 4, which was sacked by Sony Pictures Releasing, who decided to reboot the franchise with The Amazing Spider-Man. His tease was based on the newly devised concept of the multiverse which his upcoming film will dive into.Through multiverse, there would now be a possibility for several characters crossing over into the MCU from multiple fictional realities where other Marvel films such as X-Men and Raimi’s Spider-Man films are set in. Excited by the idea, he realized that “anything is possible” and that if the chance arise, he would be up for directing his planned fourth Spider-Man film, even fifteen years after its predecessor was released.After his statement, the fans lit up social media, requesting Sony to green light the idea for the said film. The fans’ requests turned into something like a campaign with people tagging @Sony on Twitter. Probably after being bombed with notifications, the social media team took it upon themselves to respond to those requests. Answering a tweet featuring an article about Raimi’s statement, the team responded,
well this has been fun for our mentions today | friendly reminder, we’re just the social team!
The team made it clear that it’s not in their rights to even escalate the fan requests to a higher level, politely asking everyone to not mention the channel in further tweets. Also, the account is actually the official account of Sony Corporation, whereas, it’s the company’s division, Sony Pictures Releasing which directly supervises the film production business.
A New Hope for Spider-Man Fans?
Since the release of Spider-Man: No Way Home, which saw story elements and characters from Raimi’s Spider-Man Trilogy (and Marc Webb’s Amazing Spider-Man films) through the concept of the multiverse, making MCU somewhat canon to the old films, fans are demanding the studio to continue the old franchises with Spider-Man 4 and The Amazing Spider-Man 3.
Raimi, who was also a consultant on No Way Home, was brought in to direct Multiverse of Madness, which will be a continuation of multiple MCU projects including No Way Home. The film is introducing the idea of the multiverse that’ll allow the studio to cross into alternate settings of previous Marvel films and have characters from each of those films interact. Given that Raimi is helming that vision for Marvel Studios, starting with Multiverse of Madness, he probably would’ve put in elements in the film that may allow Spider-Man 4 to happen, if Marvel ever wishes to do that. Raimi had earlier said,
"I've come to realize after making Doctor Strange that anything is possible, really anything in the Marvel universe, any team-ups. I love Tobey. I love Kirsten Dunst. I think all things are possible. I don't really have a story or a plan. I don't know if Marvel would be interested in that right now. I don't know what their thoughts are about that. I haven't really pursued that. But it sounds beautiful. Even if it wasn't a Spider-Man movie, I'd love to work with Tobey again, in a different role.
Of course, Marvel Studios definitely doesn’t have any immediate plans to make Spider-Man 4, and nor the execs will pick it up in the near future. It’s a desire of Sam Raimi, and he has probably used the idea of this fictional Marvel Multiverse to his advantage, setting precedence for further collaboration between old and new films through Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.