Sony Chairman Tom Rothman wants to continue the studio's deal with Disney and keep Spider-Man in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. After striking an unprecedented agreement to share the movie rights to the web-slinger in early 2015, Sony and Disney's partnership hit a snag last summer. As a result, the studios began preparing for Spider-Man to leave the MCU, rather than pressing forward as previously planned. However, after a couple weeks of highly-publicized dealmaking and one drunken phone call from Tom Holland later, Sony and Disney were able to knock out a brand-new agreement ahead of Spider-Man: Homecoming 3 starting production this year.

It's generally agreed Sony came out the winners in the new Spider-Man/Marvel deal; whereas Disney will receive a quarter of the profits from Homecoming 3 (while covering an equal percentage of the costs), Sony now gets to use Holland's Spider-Man and the MCU in their upcoming spinoff films like Morbius and Venom 2. The latter is also building up to Holland playing Peter Parker in one or more of their Spidey villain movies, beginning with a heavily-rumored cameo in Venom 2 this fall. Needless to say, Sony has plenty of reasons to want to keep their refurbished Disney deal going.

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Both Rothman and Disney head Alan Horn participated in a recent THR studio executive roundtable where, naturally, the topic of the Sony-Disney Spider-Man deal came up. When asked if the partnership could continue beyond Homecoming 3 and the mystery MCU film Holland is currently contracted to appear in, Rothman had the following to say:

"I hope so. I think this was a classic win-win-win. I think it was a win for Sony. I think it was a win for Disney. I think it was a win for fans and moviegoers. The only thing I would say about that is that news cycles and the rhythm of negotiations don’t necessarily overlap... I think we would have gotten there and the news got ahead of some things."

While Sony may've come out as the bigger winners in their new deal with Disney, it's worth remembering the Mouse House is still getting a piece of the Spider-Man pie they wouldn't have gotten otherwise. By keeping Holland's web-slinger in the MCU, they've also got fan support working in their favor, in addition to a cut of the box office returns. Couple that with the fact Disney owns the Spider-Man merchandising rights and the studio has a comfortably firm grip on the property altogether - one they would no doubt prefer to maintain. As such, it's reasonble to assume Sony and the Mouse House will eventually find a way to continue their mututally beneficial partnership once Holland's MCU contract is up (all their negotiating tactics aside).

Creatively speaking, the Sony-Disney deal is similarly good for Holland's run as Spider-Man. Rather than having to avoid any and all references to the MCU in Homecoming 3, the film is free to build upon the cliffhanger in Spider-Man: Far From Home's mid-credits scene in an organic fashion. Furthermore, Sony's upcoming spinoffs like Morbius now have the rich lore of Marvel's shared universe to draw on, rather than having to operate separately (and, more to the point, without Spider-Man). Their interactions with the MCU's Phase 4 slate will probably start out fairly one-sided in Morbius and Venom 2, but the spinoffs after that (like the mystery Sony-Marvel film recently scheduled for 2021) have the potential to build on that foundation in more significant and meanginful ways.

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Source: THR

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