Marvel's Daredevil Loses Director/Showrunner

[MovieBob]

Marvel's Daredevil Loses Director/Showrunner

Drew Goddard unexpectedly departs major Marvel project - is Sony's Sinister Six to blame?

Only one day after the shocker high-profile split of Edgar Wright from Marvel Studios' Ant-Man project, [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/134763-Edgar-Wright-No-Longer-Directing-Marvels-Ant-Man] the superhero powerhouse has another unhappy headline to deal with: Multiple sources now report/confirm that Drew Goddard has stepped aside as the showrunner for their in-development Netflix series Daredevil.

Planned as the first of four made-for-streaming series (with Luke Cage, Iron Fist and Alias: Jessica Jones to follow) set to culminate in the team-up miniseries The Defenders, series is set to follow the adventures of blind NYC attorney Matt Murdock, who uses his unusually-heightened remaining senses to fight crime as a costumed vigilante. Unlike Wright, Goddard (who was to direct the first episode along with showrunning) is not leaving Marvel entirely - he will stay with the series as an executive producer while his longtime colleague Steven DeKnight (formerly of Buffy, Angel and Spartacus) will step into the top spot.

No reason was immediately given for the move. However, movie news website Cinema Blend is reporting [http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Drew-Goddard-Daredevil-Departure-May-Mean-Sony-Wants-Sinister-Six-Soon-43163.html] that another Marvel hero may have contributed to the difficulty: Spider-Man. While by no means an outright flop, Sony's expensive Amazing Spider-Man 2 is struggling at the U.S. box-office and is now expected to only barely turn a profit overseas, casting serious doubts on the viability of other projects in what the studio had planned as a multi-film franchise to rival Marvel's Avengers and Warner Bros upcoming Justice League.

Along with his Daredevil duties, Goddard was set to write and direct the villain-centric Spidey-spinoff The Sinister Six for Sony. Though originally planned to release after Amazing Spider-Man 3, rumors have swirled for weeks that Part 2's disappointing box-office and lukewarm reviews were had the studio wanting to fast-track the ambitious Six - which is being described as "The Avengers, but with villains" - for a January 2014 start date. If so, it's possible that Goddard's exit was partly due to wanting to focus on that bigger, more demanding project.


Daredevil is still on track to begin shooting in July, for a projected 2015 release date.


Source: Cinema Blend [http://www.latino-review.com/news/exclusive-drew-goddard-has-left-marvels-daredevil]

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[SonOfVoorhees]

The thing about fast tracking the sinister six is it will have 6 villians. Not all of them known to the film going public. Would have been better to make all 6 appear in various spidey movies and then they team up. We would then know them and it would be great. But given spidey 2 was mediocre and the glimpse of the dr ock arms and vulture wings, i just think they will rush it. Give random baddies the wings and arm (like with rhinos suit) and off they go. No real character building or anything. With Avengers we got prequel movie for each Avenger so we got their character history etc then in Avengers there was no need to worry about histories and how each became a hero. With Sinister 6, they cant fit all 6 back histories into one movie.....which is why i wonder if they will all be generic villians given new powers because osborne hates spidey. If they release S6 instead of Spidey 3 then do they have anything planned at all or are they just making it up as they go?

But then Spidey is making money when you look at world sales, and a movie lives and dies by its script. So who knows.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

**SNIP**

I can't be sure but I think you've credited Fox with Spider-Man when Sony owns the rights not Fox (two different studios).

 

[JarinArenos]

"The Avengers, but with villains"

Wouldn't you have to... you know... actually have had to introduce the characters in their own popular movies for that to even vaguely resemble reality?

 

[Kenjitsuka]

"the studio wanting to fast-track the ambitious Six - which is being described as "The Avengers, but with villains" - for a January 2014 start date. "

Januaray 2014? Wow, then they'd better hurry up!
OT: It's probably a good thing, because ASM 3 is pretty much guaranteed to be another big flop, but Sinister Six sounds quite appealing to me.

 

[octafish]

I...I don't want to see what Sony plans to do with Kraven. Ugh.

I was kind of hoping that superhero movies would continue to build success upon success, and one day, maybe someone would actually pay John Ostrander to write a Suicide Squad film. That's never going to happen though. Sigh.

 

[Saltyk]

Wasn't there someone that predicted that this sort of thing will eventually happen? Movies tend to go in trends. For a while, one type of movie is a huge success and everyone makes that type of movie. But eventually the market becomes over saturated with those movies and people stop caring about them.

Now, it is possible that the Marvel movies can buck the trend, but one major reason is that they tend to be "fun" movies and Guardians of the Galaxy certainly seems to be tons of fun. The Marvel movies also have a definite connection and involved story going on between them and might encourage people to watch them as well. However, it's entirely possible that Marvel's movies will suffer the same fate.

Mind you, as someone said, not even Amazing Spider Man 2 seems to be losing money. It's just not making "Avengers money".

Not sure if the "Justice League in all but name" movie can do the same, but it does have two of the most well known heroes headlining it and that can help.

 

[Kameburger]

You know I trust Marvel will find someone and this will turn out ok some how, even if it takes a few tries. Spider-man however, is more of a concern. You know for all these super hero franchises and their respectively attached studios there seems to be one over arching theme either directly contributing to their success or conversely detracting from it.
In marvel's case there is a certain lack of shame and pride in the material. For Fox it is more of a "how do we make this content feel real, " but for Sony, it seems to be "go big or go bigger."

Every terrible decision from Sony seems to be based on this idea that simple is bad, and that small is worse. So they cram more villains, more spectacular set pieces, more personalities into Peter Parker, Hell they had so much trouble juggling three villains in Part 2 that making it 6 now is almost sure to be ridiculously dumb. I have little doubt of that.

You know what would be cool for the next part of Spiderman?
A movie adaption of "Family Business," The story itself is already almost written like a movie script and instead of being about ridiculous set pieces, it might actually just be a good movie.