Today's News: Spidey loses his Webb

Yesterday's hottest news today on my blog!:

http://www.moviescene.nl/p/154451/webb_niet_terug_voor_amazing_spider-man_4

All good things come to an end, and for most directors, the number three is that magical line where they tend to call it quits. There's exceptions of course, like Michael Bay on Transformers, but then, that is not a good thing. It doesn't happen very often that a director working on a major franchise continues to work in that capacity beyond three movies. Sam Raimi stepped down as director on the previous Spider-Man trilogy at a point where that was still intended to feature more than just three movies (but as history willed it, Spider-Man 4 was dropped by the studio in favor of the current rebooted series). Marc Webb seems to follow closely in his footsteps in this regard. You'd think Webb might want to show off and do at least one more of these films just to stick it to Raimi, but such frivolous thoughts of competition apparently do no enter his mind. A job as advisor is enough for him when he has finished his trilogy, he says. And who can blame him? We gotta cut these directors some slack when doing three movies in a row and then deciding to call it a day. They spend years and years working on the same characters, the same type of films, propelled by the same high expectations by the studio and the general audience alike. That takes its toll. Webb will have spent the better part of a decade doing Spider-Man when he's done. Maybe he'd like to spend more time with the wife and kids for a change? Though no doubt he liked his experience on the first movie - and the paychecks that accompanied the job - well enough to have at it two more times, there comes a point where any director needs something new to keep thoroughly engaged. Directors are creative people that continuously crave new challenges and different types of projects. If they keep regurgitating their energy for doing the exact same thing for ten years, quality of the end results is bound to suffer, and nobody will be the wiser. Raimi's much maligned Spider-Man 3 already seemed to suffer from such deterioration, and we have yet to see how well Webb will cope on his third Spidey movie. Nevertheless, since these new Spider-Man movies too make the studio stupendous amounts of money, you can't blame them for wanting to keep the momentum going. Especially when they see how great Marvel Studios is doing with their Avengers approach, which they have now copied with the intention of exploring and expanding Spider-Man's universe, for the moment seemingly ad infinitum. Not only have they slated two more Amazing Spider-Man movies after next month's second installment, villain spin-offs Sinister Six and Venom are also in the works, whether the audience wants them or not. Hey Webb, how about doing Venom when you're done with Spider-Man? He's just like Spidey, except in black and evil, so totally different. There's your creative challenge right there!