It's coming up to three years since Spider-Man: No Way Home was released. After delivering flops like Morbius and Madame Web, Sony Pictures is understandably keen to get its biggest money-maker back in theaters, and that may happen sooner than expected.
According to scooper Daniel Richtman, the current plan is for Spider-Man 4 to begin shooting in late September. With a smooth production and a quick enough turnaround, this could lead to the movie being with us as soon as next year.
For context, Spider-Man: Far From Home started shooting in July 2018 and was released to glowing reviews less than a year later.
The problem is, Spider-Man 4 doesn't currently have a director.
Richtman reiterates that no filmmaker is attached, but confirms Marvel Studios and Sony Pictures have put an offer out to someone. Drew Goddard and Justin Lin are among the names supposedly in the mix for this next instalment, though there may be other contenders (especially as Goddard recently signed up to write and direct a Matrix reboot).
Plot details for Spider-Man 4 remain a closely guarded secret. We've heard Peter Parker might team up with Daredevil and Ant-Man to do battle with The Kingpin, though there's also been chatter about some sort of Multiverse component to the story involving Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield's Spider-Men.
Either way, we expect this movie to set the stage for the web-slinger to be key a player in the upcoming Avengers movies (where he's expected to be a lead character).
"All I can say is that we have been actively engaging in conversations about what it could potentially look like for a fourth rendition of my character," Holland said last November. "Whether or not we can find a way to do justice to the character is another thing."
"I feel very protective over Spider-Man," the actor continued. "I feel very, very lucky that we were able to work on a franchise that got better with each movie, that got more successful with each movie, which I think is really rare, and I want to protect his legacy. So, I won’t make another one for the sake of making another one. It will have to be worth the while of the character."
Stay tuned for updates as we have them. And, if you'd like to learn more about what was once planned for Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 4, you can check out our recent interview with Dylan Baker in the player below.