Raimi and Maguire Return

This is the BIG news we’ve all been wait­ing and hop­ing for. Both main star Tobey Maguire and direc­tor Sam Raimi have been locked in to Spider-man 4! This report comes from the reli­able scoop web­site Nikki Finke’s Dead­line Hol­ly­wood Daily. There is not yet a deal for Kirsten Dunst to return as Mary Jane Watson.

Prin­ci­pal Pho­tog­ra­phy & Main Villain

Prin­ci­pal pho­tog­ra­phy is set to begin in the fall of 2009 to tar­get a May 2011 release. The long gap until that date affords time to recruit a main vil­lain; with spec­u­la­tion strongly sug­gest­ing Dr. Curt Connors/The Lizard. The Sin­is­ter Six have also been men­tioned. Vil­lain rumors for Spider-man 4.

Spider-man 4 and Spider-man 5 together

The report also states, as pre­vi­ously rumored, that they are look­ing for angles at pro­duc­ing the next two sequels at the same time because of its cost effec­tive­ness and the dif­fi­culty in keep­ing every­one together.

Venom Movie

And Sony has hired a pair of screen­writ­ers to get going on the Spider-Man 3 spin­off movie Venom. Given that comic book artist/writer and action fig­ure maker, Todd McFar­lane, who is one of the cre­ators of the Mar­vel vil­lain, doesn’t think a Venom movie could do well with a vil­lain as the cen­tral char­ac­ter, my sources think Sony should let Topher Grace, even though he was blown up at the end of Spider-Man 3 (yet a por­tion of the Venom cos­tume sur­vived), stay in the role because the like­able actor could be a a sym­pa­thetic evildoer.

Thanks Robin!