Whilst many seem more than happy to bash Sony Pictures’ attempts to build it own universe of Marvel characters (SPUMC), those same people often ignore Sony Pictures Animation’s highly acclaimed and Oscar-winning “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse” in their arguments.
As part of Sony Pictures Animation’s 20th anniversary, The Wrap spoke with many who broke through at the company, including ‘Spider-Verse’ producers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller who say the studio was the only one that could have created the film regardless of the Spider-Man rights factor.
Lord and Miller got their start at Sony Pictures Animation with “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs” leading to their successful careers with “The Lego Movie,” “21 Jump Street” and a whole bunch of writing and producing credits on films, shows and games including “The Afterparty,” “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” “The Last Man on Earth” and “Sackboy: A Big Adventure”.
The pair helped write and produce the Spider-verse films and say the reason that film was such a success is that the studio isn’t locked into a rigid formula as to how films are made. Miller says:
“One thing that was really great was that it’s a studio that didn’t have a long legacy of ‘This is how we do things here,’ which is a great advantage to people like us who always want to do things differently…
I don’t think we could have made Spider-Verse at any other studio, not just because Sony has the rights to Spider-Man. I think there are a lot of gatekeepers in animation about this is what works and what doesn’t work and this is the way we do things and this is what audiences want to see.”
The studio isn’t resting on its laurels over the success of ‘Spider-Verse’ though, which is resulting in the sequel “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” once again pushing boundaries and filmmaking to the limit with things they are attempting.
Miller says: “The things that we’re doing in this new Spider-Verse movie are breaking the pipelines all over again. But everyone’s excited about it and not just terrified.” Lord adds: “It’s definitely more insane. We finally made some people nervous. I feel like we’ve done our job.”
The article also confirms that next year we’ll see Sony Animation’s upcoming 2D animated “Agent King” series, which re-imagines Elvis as an undercover CIA agent. The series has received the full endorsement of Priscilla Presley and the entire Elvis estate and boasts costumes designed by John Varvatos.
“Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” is slated for release on June 2nd 2023, and “Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse” on March 29th 2024.
