Right, so it appears that the waters have now become a little muddied where all things Spider-Man are concerned.

It was only last month that Tom Hardy was announced to headline Sony Pictures’ Venom, which was to exist in a shared universe with another upcoming picture, the Silver Sable and Black Cat team-up effort titled simply Silver and Black. While these characters were to exists in a Spider-Verse of sorts, said shared world wouldn’t actually tie to Tom Holland’s Spider-Man and the Marvel Cinematic Universe. We know, we know, our heads hurt, too.

Now, though, Amy Pascal, the former Head of Sony, has made things a little more confusing. Speaking to Filmstarts about Venom and Silver and Black, Pascal explained, “Well, those movies will all take place in the world that we’re now creating for Peter Parker. They’ll be adjuncts to it, they may be different locations, but it will still all be in the same world and they will be connected to each other as well.” She then added, “There’s always a chance!” when asked whether Holland’s Wall-crawler may appear in Sony’s shared Spider-Verse.

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What’s even more interesting is that sat next to Pascal there is Kevin Feige, the President of Marvel Studios who only last week said how there’s absolutely no plans whatsoever at this stage for Venom to be tied to the MCU, for it was solely a Sony project.

Famously, Sony Pictures picked up the rights to Spider-Man and his supporting cast back when Marvel sold off the rights to various properties back in the 1990s when the company was faced with huge financial problems. Since then, we’ve had the Tobey Maguire-starring, Sam Raimi-helmed Spider-Man trilogy, before Andrew Garfield donned the tights in Marc Webb’s The Amazing Spider-Man – a franchise that had been announced as four main pictures and two spin-offs before it was completely canned following the hugely disappointing The Amazing Spider-Man 2. With Sony having the rights to Spidey, that’s why ol’ Web-head had been kept out of the main Marvel Cinematic Universe that Marvel Studios and Disney had crafted… that is, until a deal was shockingly struck that saw Sony and Marvel come together to have Spider-Man appear in the MCU. That deal saw Sony and Marvel split creative control and financial success between them for these MCU appearances, and Tom Holland was brought in on a six-picture deal as Spidey.

Upon Venom being announced, it was immediately said how this would be a film set in a new shared Spider-Verse that would have no links to the MCU Spider-Man, and thus would actually have no Spidey in it. Stupid, right?

What Amy Pascal’s comments mean now, though, remains to be seen. Certain rumours out there did previously suggest that Holland’s six-picture deal was only for five MCU movies, with Sony regaining full control of the character for the sixth and final film of Holland’s contract.

As ever, expect more on all of this as it develops. One thing we do know for sure, though, is that Zombieland’s Ruben Fleischer is directing Venom, with that film set to start shooting later this year ahead of on October 5th, 2018 release.