Back when there was going to be a Sam Raimi-directed Spider-man 4, before Sony lost its goddamn mind, John Malkovich was rumored to star as the vulture, the main villain of the piece.

Collider recently spoke to John Malkovich who confirmed that it was indeed the case. He seems a little confused why it didn’t happen, but offered up his opinion.

“Well, I think a lot of the people who sort of follow that genre… I’m not sure, I never really spoke with Sam about this, but I’m not sure they — maybe the kind of fanbase, the fanboys — either didn’t approve of that character as an adversary for him to some extent…or maybe the studio. Or maybe that was totally unrelated to why it fell apart.”

It wasn’t the first role as a Spidey villain he was offered, as he passed on playing Green Goblin in the first film. It will be interesting to see who they pick for the main baddie of the Spider-man reboot… after all, Spidey’s only as good as the people he’s up against.