I guess this happens when spider-man hits over a billion.
Honestly, I kinda fault Disney here. From what I read, they wanted more money for it and Sony said no. Disney was in no position to make that deal after the last two Spider-Man films, into the spider-verse, and Venom. All very well performing even if Venom mostly sucked.
They wanted more risk as well, as they wanted to co-finance. And Disney was very much in a position to ask for this, as they were directly responsible for the biggest money-maker in Sony history.
This is foolish on Sony's part. Spider-Man will most likely devolve into irrelevance, as they have shown they don't know how to do a film series. Kevin Feige brought cohesion to the Spider-Man film world. They will not know what the hell to do on their own. They have shown that already.
Hef, you know I'd rather cut off Stadler's arm than disagree with you, but I got to here a bit.
Disney essentially showed Sony how to make a great Spider-Man movie. They also (at least helped) secure good writers, a director, a brilliant cast, etc. At this point Sony just has to let the machine run itself. You know?
And risk? Come on. There's no risk here. MCU Spider-Man isn't going to fail by any stretch.
Right now Sony has the rights, the strategy from Disney, the cast, the writers, the director, etc. I'm sure they feel they can do just fine without Disney taking 5%, though they were apparently happy to offer them that continuing.
Let's also not forget that Sony did Into the Spider-Verse by themselves. Oscar winning film.
I didn't like Venom at all but it did VERY well.
I feel like Sony feels confident, and rightfully so.
There's two major issues, but they're all artistic, which these business people don't care about.
1) Spider-Man can no longer reference almost anything from the last two movies, plus he loses a lot of his tech and his..you know...entire motivation that the MCU gave him.
2) MCU can no longer reference Spider-Man. That's going to be weird, but oddly enough easier for the MCU to pull off than Sony.
I am NOT happy and really hope one of two things happens, 1) They figure out a deal and stop being selfish dicks, or 2) Disney just outright buys Spider-Man, but I don't see that happening any time until the franchise dies.