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David Mumpower: As I referenced in the Garfield question, I believe that there is unmistakable downward spiral occurring. Just within the current Garfield/Webb iteration, the first movie earned $137 million during its first six days of North American release. Yes, there was some holiday inflation involved; the movie still reached $200 million in 10 days, though. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 has required five days to reach $100 million. It is running 20% behind the pace of its predecessor. The first Monday-to-Monday comparison includes a 32% decline. Sony can hope and pray that it's an issue caused by school being in session. By the time kids are on summer vacation, however, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 will have lost most of its screens. And I say all of the above before we factor in ticket price inflation.

Sony made the hard choice to reboot the franchise quickly in a cynical attempt to capitalize upon the soaring popularity of other comic book properties, particularly Iron Man and Batman. The result has been a product that most people (sorry, Felix) consider inferior, derivative and relatively pointless. Sony is fortunate in that the overseas marketplace has spiked during this timeframe so as long as nobody focuses on the capital retention of that revenue, they can trumpet the product as successful.

The reality of the Spider-Man problem is simple. The first movie was released in 2002. By 2014, we are already up to five titles; also, the franchise is already repeating itself with story themes. As Disney continues to masterfully develop the world of The Avengers, Sony has the rights to a Marvel property that was once so popular that the Playstation 3 used its fonts and trumpeted the films for its woeful failure, UMD media. Now Sony is struggling in all phases as their business practices have proven outdated in the quickly evolving technology era.

Spider-Man is a viable brand in theory that they would prefer to harness by creating their own multi-billion dollar Marvel realm. Unfortunately, Spider-Man lacks the rogues gallery of Batman or Superman, so they must keep regurgitating the same premises. What they seem to be hoping will happen is that Disney will desire Spider-Man as an Avenger, thereby either reinvigorating their brand or providing a tidy cash payment for the rights to the character. That seems to be the eventual endgame, independent of how many movie rumors there are for the 2020s.

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