MORBIUS Director Continues Dodging Questions About Missing Vulture Scenes When Asked About Studio Interference

MORBIUS Director Continues Dodging Questions About Missing Vulture Scenes When Asked About Studio Interference

Morbius director Daniel Espinosa continues to avoid questions about those missing scenes involving Michael Keaton's Adrian Toomes, while responding to the theory studio interference led to big changes...

By JoshWilding - Apr 05, 2022 11:04 AM EST
Filed Under: Morbius
Source: Uproxx

If you've seen Morbius, we're sure you're aware that almost all the shots in the trailers featuring Michael Keaton's Adrian Toomes were missing from the movie itself. Based on comments made by the actor, it's blatantly obvious that all but one of the scenes we do see - when he's being led out of prison - were the product of reshoots caused by the events of Spider-Man: No Way Home

Well, that and the likelihood that Sony believed they would no longer be working with Marvel Studios and sharing Spider-Man when Morbius was being shot (making this movie the perfect place to connect Spidey's world with Sony's Marvel Universe through various references). We'd bet that Toomes was once just a non-Multiversal prisoner who tried to convince the Living Vampire to join him in his quest to take out Peter Parker, but the truth may never come to light. 

Talking to Uproxx, Morbius director Daniel Espinosa has continued to dodge questions about those missing Vulture scenes. "The first thing that happened was that we had Michael Keaton because we were planning on doing this. But then when Spider-Man: No Way Home came out, it said, 'This is how the visual effects are," he explained. "And then the idea of having him just encountering him in that universe seemed too complicated, and then we put it in the end."

"The idea of having different timelines was something that was, for me, introduced within the movie universe with Into the Spider-Verse," he said when pushed to elaborate. "When we were talking about making the movie, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse had just come out and it was a huge success. I told the guys, I said, 'This is super common among comic book readers.'"

As you'll see if you take a look at the original interview, nothing he says there addresses what the journalist was asking about Toomes' scenes being reshot. Espinosa would go on to insist that Sony created the Multiverse before Marvel Studios, and tried to make sense of The Vulture recruiting the heroic Living Vampire for his team by noting, "Vulture is not a criminal in that universe just yet."

"I think that’s more one of those scenes that are made that when you have scenes before that in a movie comes along, that will explain that reposition," he added when pushed on why Morbius would have any sort of interest in potentially taking aim at any world's Spider-Man. 

When it was put to the filmmaker that Morbius doesn't really feel like a movie he would make and that the cut he turned in may not be the one that's been torn apart by critics, Espinosa issued a brief response. "These movies are big ideas. I think that I work at my best if I get a lot of decision power. But, in these movies, they’re big movies that have a lot of people’s interest."

If we're going to read between the lines, it's probably Avi Arad and Matt Tolmach who pushed for changes to be made that resulted in Morbius confounding and angering fans. After all, you need only look back at what they were cooking up for The Amazing Spider-Man franchise once upon a time...

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TheWalkingCuban
TheWalkingCuban - 4/5/2022, 11:31 AM
“Morbius director keeps showing integrity and selling the car instead of passing the buck”
GhostDog
GhostDog - 4/5/2022, 11:35 AM
Sony seeing him continually dodge questions:
micvalpro
micvalpro - 4/5/2022, 11:36 AM
Morbius is such a misstep for Sony. Ruining the good thing they had with Marvel and tarnishing Keatons role.
Dope21
Dope21 - 4/5/2022, 11:45 AM
@micvalpro - what good thing they had with Marvel
HAILHYDRA
HAILHYDRA - 4/5/2022, 11:40 AM
I’m amazed at the gymnastics this guy is doing to avoid saying “Sony wanted an MCU character in this movie regardless of how it made sense. And a bunch of reshoots were done to try to make this somewhat coherent with No Way Home.”
Dope21
Dope21 - 4/5/2022, 11:43 AM
Who's the more trash comic studio. DC or Sony?
Killuminatic
Killuminatic - 4/5/2022, 11:53 AM
@Dope21 - <--------------Also trash
MUTO123
MUTO123 - 4/5/2022, 1:22 PM
@Dope21 - Sony, easily. DC at least tries with their movies, and they aren’t actively trying to [frick] over another studio in the process.
Winston19
Winston19 - 4/5/2022, 3:04 PM
@Dope21 - Sony. DC makes movies about characters we want to see it’s just very hit or miss. Sony is just throwing shit on the wall hoping something sticks.
ModHaterSLADE
ModHaterSLADE - 4/5/2022, 11:44 AM
The less Keaton has to do with this one the better.
TheHumanSpider2
TheHumanSpider2 - 4/5/2022, 11:56 AM
bkmeijer1
bkmeijer1 - 4/5/2022, 12:00 PM
So basically ''we had no idea what we or Marvel Studios was doing, so we just throw it on the multiverse''. Gotta hand it to Espinosa for knowing what the multiverse is though
ElvenKingSlayer
ElvenKingSlayer - 4/5/2022, 12:04 PM
Du gjorde en skitfilm Espinosa! Släpp det och gå vidare!
MyCoolYoung
MyCoolYoung - 4/5/2022, 12:08 PM
Sounds like sony was kean on taking Spider-Man out of the mcu then morbius was written with the knowledge that Tom would be in that universe but then they struck a deal and had to scramble to bring Keaton's vulture into this universe which wasn't thoroughly thought out.

"Nobody understands this multiverse shit just bring him"
- sony execs probably
eagc1995
eagc1995 - 4/5/2022, 12:33 PM
@MyCoolYoung - Well it was actually confirmed that the deal fell apart when they were working on FFH but they didnt told Tom Holland, Jon Watts and co, so when they were doing Morbius the understanding at the studio was that there would be no more MCU Spidey films as things were not working out behind the scenes
MyCoolYoung
MyCoolYoung - 4/5/2022, 4:35 PM
@eagc1995 - right thats why I said morbius was wrote with the assumption Tom would be in the sonyverse hence why they filmed that murderer scene
eagc1995
eagc1995 - 4/7/2022, 12:11 PM
@MyCoolYoung - Yeah and lets not too forget that there were set pictures of bus for Morbius with huge Daily Bugle headlines printed on them saying "WHERE IS SPIDER-MAN?"
Ha1frican
Ha1frican - 4/5/2022, 12:10 PM
It seems pretty clear they were going to imply this was set in the MCU by just including Vulture to get people to see it (which would have worked on me so it was the right call) but with the delays that ended up past NWH where the multiversal rules were clearly established they had to back off
DalekCraigWasson
DalekCraigWasson - 4/5/2022, 12:30 PM
I feel bad that Sony has basically thrown Morbius' director to the wolves. It's pretty clear "Spider-Totem," for example, is something Sony told him after they looked at things they had the rights to and saw Ezekiel and Morlun, but has no idea what it means other than something to say when people ask if there's a Spider-Man in Morbius' world.
GhostDog
GhostDog - 4/5/2022, 12:54 PM
@DalekCraigWasson - we're going to get an Ezekiel movie. I would bet so much on it.

THey're doing a Madame Web movie for [frick]s sake lol
Arthorious
Arthorious - 4/5/2022, 12:31 PM


TheLobster
TheLobster - 4/5/2022, 1:00 PM
SONY better send him a fruit basket for covering for their incompetent asses.

Also, [frick] SONY. They never deserved the IP to begin with.
Mugens
Mugens - 4/5/2022, 1:46 PM
Anytime I see Avi Arad's name attached to any project, especially Marvel projects, I get a bad taste in my mouth and don't expect much.
SonOfAGif
SonOfAGif - 4/5/2022, 4:07 PM
I love question dodging. ROBERT DOWNEY JR is the king of question dodging.
MosquitoFarmer
MosquitoFarmer - 4/5/2022, 7:54 PM
Sounds altogether like a clusterf*ck of notions.
ANewPope
ANewPope - 4/5/2022, 10:17 PM
The sooner the full rights go back to Marvel, the better.
String
String - 4/6/2022, 1:02 AM
Sony has not learned any lessons about constructing a cohesive universe. You would think some of Kevin Feige's influence would have rubbed off on them, but I guess only those working on Tom Holland's Spider-Man films, like Amy Pascal, perhaps have.

I keep forgetting Morbius was filmed when Sony planned on removing Spider-Man from the MCU. Remember it was reported Watts & Feige knew at the end of Far From Home's production Sony was pulling Spider-Man back. The creators of that film did not tell the cast at the time. So all the Vulture connections we saw in the initial Morbius promos was SONY'S reinterpretation of Vulture. The character had no MCU connection at that time. When Sony/Disney reupped their Spider-Man deal, the studio had to figure a way to reconnect their Vulture back to the MCU. The studio tried to use No Way Home's plot to make it work. But it insults fans intelligence that Sony thought they could pull a fast one on us.

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