[TokuKnight89]

Quote:

Originally Posted by acdcguy

They could not buy Sony as a company. That would be a monopoly. Disney already is arguably. Even if they were to just buy Columbia Pictures from Sony, the governments of the USA and Japan would not allow it. Especially after the recent purchase of 20th Century Fox by Disney; Disney could not afford such a purchase at this moment and the government plus public opinion would object to yet another Disney purchase. It just would not look good for Disney which already has an image problem due to their handling of Star Wars, and among other things.

That said Disney could convince Sony to sell Columbia Pictures assets to a rival studio which would make Sony's rights to Spider-Man expire and revert back to Disney. That said Sony will still maintain a stake in Spider-Man as not only did Sony buy the film rights to Spider-Man from Marvel they also bought a stake in the character in all forms of media. Anything Disney does with Spider-Man must be signed off by Sony first.

All hope is not lost though. We may have a year without Spider-Man in the MCU as Disney and Sony continue to hash things out. If all talk is dead, Sony will move forward with a reboot as John Watts has left Sony (allegedly) and Tom Holland's contract allows for him to walk if the Sony/Disney deal falls through. Any Spider-Man films produced by Sony will likely see Dark Phoenix box office numbers due to the court of opinion objecting to yet another non-MCU Spidey. Also back in 2011 Sony sold all merchandising rights of Spider-Man back to Disney. Disney has the upper hand as they can effectively destroy any and all marketing of Sony's non-MCU Spidey films.

There is one aspect that is missing: Into The Spider-Verse sequel!

While "court of opinion" is remarkably powerful and could stifle a live-action Spidey, a follow-up to the aforementioned animated spectacular is another matter entirely. Even people who don't care for Sony's Marvel Movies or Marvel Comics in general absolutely loved that particular entry... and I agree with them!

Sony marketing such a sequel is the one thing (outside of a Spider-Gwen Movie) that Disney can't successfully inhibit!

If Sony wants their films in the MCU via a formal deal with Disney, then everything they make from here on out should reflect that!