*Note from Dave: Devin originally reported this on Monday 9/26, but apparently a lot of our readers missed it, judging by the number of news submissions for it that we’ve received since then. Once again, with less feeling:
Sam Raimi has struggled mightily to keep the lid on just who the villains are for the next Spider-Man film. Rumors buzzed, so when word leaked out a few weeks ago about Topher Grace playing Venom and Thomas Haden Church playing Sandman, no one was sure how to take it. Was it more of the same bullshittery that is so prevalent on the web?
Now Kirsten Dunst has opened her snaggly mouth at the Elizabethtown junket and confirmed that those are the villains, and those are the guys playing them.
"Maybe I wasn’t supposed to say that," she said. D’oh!
In the end, I like this set up better than the “they’re both Chameleon!” set up, especially since Raimi seems to have taken my advice with Venom. I always found that character to be a bore as an archnemesis, since he doesn’t reflect Spider-Man in any way. The connection is tenuous, and the aspect of the symbiote costume being angry at Peter Parker jilting it faded away a decade ago. By casting someone who isn’t all that much bigger than Toby Maguire, you could create a mirror image of Spider-Man. I don’t know how Venom’s origin will fit in the film, but if you have Eddie Brock as a nerd like Peter, and have him unable to reject the suit’s dark call, you’ve not only created a character with resonance – the dark Spider-Man – you’ve re-established what makes Peter a hero.
Of course this scenario is a special effects nightmare. Both villains would be insanely CG intensive, and while Spider-Man 2 was leaps and bounds above 1, I fear that by the time 3 is getting (quickly) finished up, the technology still won’t be up to par.