2. Competing Studios Might Actually Start Working Together
Prior to Iron Man, most Marvel movies were licensed out to other studios. Sony has control of Spider-Man, and Fox has the Fantastic Four and X-Men. These arrangements were great to kickstart the current superhero movie business, but in terms of Avengers team-ups, it also means some of Marvels best mashup-friendly charactersSpider-Man, Wolverine, and Doctor Doomare locked behind complex copyright contracts. Or are they? It turns out Sony has already demonstrated willingness to work with Marvel to join forces. In fact, Oscorp tower very nearly had a shot at appearing in the Avengers, though the two productions didnt line up enough in time. Still, Avi Arad, producer on The Amazing Spider-Man, has implied that if the right story comes along, they might be open to the idea of working together: Everything is possible. If something like that happens, its great for Disney, its great for Sony. If the right story comes in, we are now working on Venom first. Its our first out. So our thinking is in the right direction. Avengers to me was an expected success so I never looked at it because Avengers was successful. This would be an extremely rare example of studios collaborating towards a common goal where high-value properties are shared. It would probably involve forging some new revenue sharing contracts that would allow both companies to profit, but it could also allow stories to reach viewers that would otherwise sit in some writers notebook or within the confines of the comic book world. This is only good news.