If Spider-Man were to get animated movies, what would you like to see?

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I don't think the Hobgoblin mystery or Clone Saga are suited to a movie format. They were both reliant on long form mysteries and interlinking subplots, soap opera twists and turns and cliffhangers.

So are movies like Vertigo, Zodiac, Chinatown, LA Confidential, Seven among many other mystery/suspense thrillers.

Besides neither Hobhoblin and Clone Saga II are long form mysteries. They are botched execution of one in the case of the former and a padded mess in case of the latter. Neither story was ever written with the original intent. So there’s no such thing as faithful adaptation here.

[Lee]

They'd have to change and condense so much that they would barely resemble the comics. They'd be adapting an idea, rather than a full fledged story.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

They'd have to change and condense so much that they would barely resemble the comics. They'd be adapting an idea, rather than a full fledged story.

So like most adaptations of stories and plays across history, then.

I mean do people want a faithful panel for panel adaptation of Clone Saga II or the Hobgoblin mystery be the overly padded a a no unsatisfactory mess it was?

[Hypestyle]

there would be a strong push to make the movies rated G, which I would not be in great favor of. That said, I recognize Spider-Man's appeal to younger kids, so I have to just throw up my hands at a question like this. I know whatever story sounds good to me, it would be dramatically altered in any sort of 80-minute cartoon movie format. But I still think they should be done. DC does it with their characters, there's no excuse to not try, "experiment", etc., especially since, on paper, you have the backing of Disney of all entities, lol!

[Lee]

So like most adaptations of stories and plays across history, then.

Let's put it this way: they would be significantly less faithful than DC's animated adaptations of New Frontier, Gotham by Gaslight, Batman: Year One and All-Star Superman.

Some stories adapt easier to movies than others.

I mean do people want a faithful panel for panel adaptation of Clone Saga II or the Hobgoblin mystery be the overly padded a a no unsatisfactory mess it was?

No. That's why they'd have to change the stories into very different stories.

I don't think it would be feasible to translate those stories into 80 minute movies. I think they would have to take the basic premises and make brand new stories. Even then, I don't think 80 minutes would be enough to get the best out of those premises.

[Frontier]

I don't think the Hobgoblin mystery or Clone Saga are suited to a movie format. They were both reliant on long form mysteries and interlinking subplots, soap opera twists and turns and cliffhangers.

I think some of the twists and turns can be adapted into the story format. Condensing things down could actually help some of the mysteries people complained were too drawn out in the original.

[Lee]

What would an 80 minute adaptation of the Hobgoblin mystery look like? Which issues would be adapted?

Which Clone Saga issues would be adapted?

[Frontier]

What would an 80 minute adaptation of the Hobgoblin mystery look like? Which issues would be adapted?

Which Clone Saga issues would be adapted?

It probably wouldn't be a one-to-one panel-by-panel adaption but they would probably liberally take all the important story beats and meld them together.

Adaptions have been doing this for years.

[Lee]

What are the important story beats?

[Mister Mets]

I think you can probably condense the different Clone Saga's together into one movie.

Lord knows how much they had to condense for Reign of the Supermen.

The Ultimate clone saga could be one film. That was pretty solid.

Granted, much of it builds on prior continuity (IE- Carnage & Gwen.)

What would an 80 minute adaptation of the Hobgoblin mystery look like? Which issues would be adapted?

Which Clone Saga issues would be adapted?

I suspect a problem with adapting the Hobgoblin saga is that it requires establishing a backstory for the Green Goblin, and filling the viewer in on that.

Granted, one of the first Spider-Man comics I ever read was a CD Rom of the Hobgoblin's first appearance, which included a flashback to Amazing Spider-Man #39-40.

[Frontier]

The Ultimate clone saga could be one film. That was pretty solid.

Granted, much of it builds on prior continuity (IE- Carnage & Gwen.)

Or at least take from that that you can do a Clone Saga story in a condensed manner. Spec probably would have done something like that.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

Some stories adapt easier to movies than others.

Those stories (Year One, All Star Superman) also happen to be better than the Hobgoblin Saga and Clone Saga II. Quality does count you know.

The reason those stories were adapted so faithfully is that people agree that the originals are pretty good as it is. Whereas no one agrees that with these two.

What would an 80 minute adaptation of the Hobgoblin mystery look like? Which issues would be adapted?

In the case of the Hobgoblin...all the Stern stuff, none of the other stuff. Simple as that. Once you do that, you have condensed material to work with.

--You start the story with a newsreport about the "mystery of the Green Goblin" on the TV and how he died after confronting Spider-Man in the aftermath of Gwen's death. Then we see that it's Georgie Hill. He turns it off, and decides to do a job, and then he's chased by Spider-Man and stumbles into the Goblin's hideout. And he then brings an unknown man there, and he realizes what this is, and promptly kills him. That's the Cold Open. Then Credits.
-- So you then follow the Hobgoblin and Spidey going back-and-forth, meanwhile, Peter finds out that Mary Jane his ex-girlfriend is back in town and has a gig working as a model for Kingsley's catalogue. You can do certain beats, like say, MJ using Kingsley's salary to keep Peter in NY and the irony of the Hobgoblin helping Spider-Man. You can adapt the famous bit of MJ admitting she knows Peter is Spider-Man only this time it's the aftermath of a Goblin attack. So the story also has a romantic subplot of Peter and MJ getting back together, becoming friends and so on. Meanwhile Hobgoblin does his blackmail scheme planning to out Norman as Goblin and other dirty secrets at the gentleman's club as in Stern's ASM#249-252. Ned Leeds is the main red herring...show him and Peter having some bad blood or something. Him and Betty having marital strife...Peter and MJ will reflect they were best man and maid of honor at their wedding.
-- So that brings the cast together keeps the main plot and subplot connected. The climax is Peter trying to prove Ned innocent, with the help of MJ and Betty, and that finally unveils the Kingsley Twins thing, and that leads to the finale where Roderick is unmasked as in Hobgoblin Lives. Heck you could adapt it using stuff from Batman: mystery of the batwoman, which is a little known DCAU movie. That has a similar beat. In this scenario Ned Leeds dies at the end but he dies heroically and is exonerated. So his death doesn't feel as purposeless and random as it did originally, since it was instigated by Owsley out of spite.

Which Clone Saga issues would be adapted?

Clone Saga I can easily be done in a single movie, as mentioned above.

In the case of Clone Saga II there's two choices.
-- Make Ben Reilly the real Peter Parker, i.e. the original intent of the writers for Clone Saga II. So that means you adapt The Lost Years, Powers and Responsibility, the Last Adventure. So Ben is the actual Peter, the real Peter retires with MJ and becomes a Dad. And the story ends with Ben Reilly defeating the Jackal, and Kaine (now refashioned as Jackal's ultimate clone and the main heavy to defeat in the finale).
-- Whole project is an elaborate attempt to gaslight Peter by Norman, i.e. adapt the denouement of Clone Saga II which all the original people disliked and none of them worked on or approved.

In scenario one, you start with a cold open Peter fighting the Jackal and the clones at the end of Clone Saga I, though streamlined and adapted differently. So Jackal is just some mad scientist who clones people, a Norman Osborn employee gone mad. It ends with the scenario of you not being sure if the Clone or Peter died or survived. Then after that, you cut to Ben Reilly in his drifter years watching newsreports of Spider-Man on TV and you cut from him and his cast to Peter.

In scenario two, you start with Norman Osborn being impaled on the glider and then being buried, and his final words to Spider-Man are "This isn't over Parker. This is just the beginning...you'll be madder than me after what I put you through" and those words echo in Peter's head at the funeral. And then you cut some years later, and Peter runs into clones and so on with people claiming that they are real and he's fake, and that starts a mystery. The finale will reveal, that the entire clone saga was Norman's back-up attempt to come back to life. So Miles Warren was just a catspaw he funded and so on. The Clones were Norman's attempt to experiment with Spider-Man DNA and so on, and the clones are all normal people he injected to turn into copies (a la Conway's Return to Sender), and he reflects, "It worked so well that I convinced Miles Warren that he was a genius on ESU's dime". And the whole thing was an attempt to make a mockery of Peter's life and gaslight him. So this would be REVELATIONS, The Osborn Journal, with a bit of REVENGE OF THE GREEN GOBLIN thrown in. So in this scenario, Ben Reilly is just a regular guy who got injected with Peter's stuff to become a clone of him and he dies protecting Peter. In the process you can do stuff like Aunt May's death and so on.

The only problem is baby May because there's no way to do any kind of satisfying superhero story where the lead has the villain kill his unborn child and then refuses to avenge it. That just won't work.

[ngroove]

Amazing Spider-Man Annual #1, The Sinister Six, animated completely in Steve Ditko style.

[Mistah K88]

there would be a strong push to make the movies rated G, which I would not be in great favor of. That said, I recognize Spider-Man's appeal to younger kids, so I have to just throw up my hands at a question like this. I know whatever story sounds good to me, it would be dramatically altered in any sort of 80-minute cartoon movie format. But I still think they should be done. DC does it with their characters, there's no excuse to not try, "experiment", etc., especially since, on paper, you have the backing of Disney of all entities, lol!

This is a valid fear. I'd assume if Sony is behind the animated movies it would be similar to their previous animated endeavors like Spiderverse and Spectacular, which while "for kids" were generally good for all ages. If anything it would be nice to see a film that has maturity in it without extreme violence (there were points in a couple of the Batman movies that I was like "OKAY!"). However...if Disney is behind it... I would assume that they would be like the Marvel animations that they have been a part of...which...yeah it is definitely for kids and goes out of its way to remind you at every opportunity. If a case of the latter...are there any good stories from Big Wheel or Hypno Hustler for Disney to mess with? Enough for a movie's worth?

The Ultimate clone saga could be one film. That was pretty solid.

I suspect a problem with adapting the Hobgoblin saga is that it requires establishing a backstory for the Green Goblin, and filling the viewer in on that.

Granted, one of the first Spider-Man comics I ever read was a CD Rom of the Hobgoblin's first appearance, which included a flashback to Amazing Spider-Man #39-40.

In the age of "we don't need to see the origin again" we might not even need to actually see Norman's extra curricular activities. When Harry leaves the party and Peter goes after him we could have Harry provide the backstory and confide in Peter that his father Norman was also the criminal known as the Green Goblin who died in an altercation with Spider-Man, and this "Hobgoblin" is blackmailing him about this fact.

[Dark Soul # 7]

I'd like to see a movie focused on the Sinister Six as a threat, like pick pieces from some of the more famous storylines with the group (ASM Annual #1, The Return of the Sinister Six, Ends of the Earth) and explore what kind of a threat these guys really are and how Spider-man stops. Could be a fun grand action adventure.

Spider-Island seems kinda primed for the animated movie treatment. Though you'd have to remove any serious involvement from most characters not related to Spider-man I think, so no other super heroes gaining spider-powers. You can probably dump Carlie too.

It's kinda niché I guess, but I'd like to see a movie where Alistaire Smythe and his spider-slayers are the main threat. I always liked them in the Spider-man animated show, and I want to see some more of them. One of the more famous stories with Smythe does involve MJ tricking him so adapt in that part and she gets to be directly involved as well. That'd be cool.