Much has been made of the great battle between Marvel Studios and Warner/DC over the hearts and minds (...and dollars) of fanboys and the rest of the viewing public. When Warner Brothers so unceremoniously released their DC movie slate for the next five years people noted a few things. Among them, they noted that DC will likely beat Marvel/Disney to the first solo female superhero film with Wonder Woman announced for June of 2017. With recent reports that the MCU's phase three will not end where we all assumed it would, people pointed out that if Justice League 2's (June 2019)
main baddie does turn out to be Darkseid as it is rumored, he may get the front and center treatment before Thanos can truly menace Earth's Mightiest in the MCU's much speculated all-franchise event (Infinity Gauntlet). Yes of course Thanos appeared a long time ago in The Avengers and had an arguably less than meaty role (screen time-wise) in Guardians Of The Galaxy but unless the mad titan has a larger presence in the Guardian's sequel this will likely be the case.
The story however that seems to have eluded most discussion thread's that I creepily lurked in is the great blow that has been dealt to Sony's fragilely budding Spiderverse. Oh yes, people. Shots
have been fired albeit with all the noise of a silenced pistol. Sony in an attempt to build their own cinematic universe,had already announced their supervillain ensemble
The Sinister Six for a November 2016 release. Then with Warner's recent game plan announcement, it was revealed that their rumored Suicide Squad film is slated for August 2016. That's roughly 3 months before
Sinister Six. As many may have observed, in cases where where movies with similar premises/content are released within relatively close proximity to each other, the second film to be released most often gets less attention (see Olympus Has Fallen v. White House Down).
This is a blow that the struggling Sony can nary afford with their flagship superhero franchise already on shaky ground much less it's respective spin-offs. The often reliable Devin Faraci of Badass Digest has apparently been hearing from sources that "
Venom is functionally dead again". He also reports of whispers about a possible Spider-Man "soft reboot" in the form of inclusion in said Sinister Six picture. It's currently unknown whether a rumored connection to Marvel Studios' MCU can or will ever come to pass much less if the help is quantifiable but with everything else to lose, it might just be the shot in the arm that Sony so desperately needs right now.