‘Spider-Verse’ Artists Claim Working on the Film Was ‘Death by a Thousand Paper Cuts,’ Third Film Might Be Delayed

According to people who worked on “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” the working conditions required to produce the staggering artistry behind the visuals was not sustainable.

Multiple ‘Across the Spider-Verse’ crew members — ranging from artists to production executives who have worked anywhere from five to a dozen years in the animation business — describe the process of making the the $150 million Sony project as uniquely arduous, involving a relentless kind of revisionism that compelled approximately 100 artists to flee the movie before its completion.

Many of the complaints have to do with producer/writer Phil Lord’s management style, especially his seeming inability to conceptualize 3-D animation and his preference to edit fully rendered work instead.

‘Across the Spider-Verse’ was originally set for a release in April of 2022, before it was postponed to October of that year and then June 2023. The reason given was “pandemic-related delays.” However …

The four crew members say animators who were hired in the spring of 2021 sat idle for anywhere from three to six months that year while Lord tinkered with the movie in the layout stage, when the first 3-D representation of storyboards are created.

It sure sounds like the main creators behind ‘Across the Spider-Verse’ were trying to treat the film as a live-action movie, where you can just reshoot a scene, but that's a completely insane way to tackle animation.

There were constant changes and cuts. Supposedly, with Lord, nothing is ever final or approved. Nothing was really set in stone. They were incapable of committing to an idea. One animator even claims Lord fought with Sony on ‘Across the Spider-Verse’ for the entire process, rewriting the film up until the last minute.

As a result, the creatives in the Vulture article are saying they were pushed to work more than 11 hours a day, 7 days a week, for more than a year to make up for time lost and were forced back to the drawing board as many as five times to revise work during the final rendering stage.

We also found out today that there are different cuts of the movie being screened in theaters, where certain details or minor lines are different in a number of scenes. Yes, multiple cuts of the film have been playing in theaters this whole time. Andrew Leviton, who worked as an associate editor in the sequel, congratulated a viewer on Twitter for correctly identifying the different versions.

Isn’t this constantly a problem with Phil Lord abd his partner Chris Miller? I feel like a version of this story comes out every time they’re involved with a new project. This makes me think twice about the actual reason why they left the Star Wars film ‘Solo.’ Many people blamed Kathleen Kennedy for that, but maybe he’s just an overbearing person to work with, creatively speaking.

Yes, the third film, ‘Beyond the Spider-Verse’ is supposed to be released in March of next year, but it sure looks as though it might not be ready on time. Sources are saying it’s not close to being completed. In a recent interview, Hailey Steinfeld even admitted that she hadn't even started the voiceover work for the next one. Expect this one to be delayed.

Here’s what one person from the production crew said about ‘Beyond the Spider-Verse’ potentially being delayed:

There’s no way that movie’s coming out then. There’s been progress on the pre-production side of things. But as far as the production side goes, the only progress that’s been made on the third one is any exploration or tests that were done before the movie was split into two parts. Everyone’s been fully focused on Across the Spider-Verse and barely crossing the finish line. And now it’s like, Oh, yeah, now we have to do the other one.

Oh, and amidst all of this crazy chaos, Sony’s Amy Pascal, head honcho of all Spider-Man films, responded to Vulture’s report with this doozy:

“It really does happen on every film. If the story isn’t right, you have to keep going until it is […] I guess, welcome to making a movie.”