Photo of John Malkovich’s Vulture Wings from Sam Raimi’s unproduced SPIDER-MAN 4

It’s hard not to wonder what Sam Raimi’S spider man 4 it would have been like. I was a huge fan of his Spider-Man movies, and was excited when he was actually developing a fourth movie, which he would see John Malkovich like The Vulture. It would have been the villainous Marvel character’s first live-action debut.

The script for spider man 4 it was complete, the writers spent over a year developing it, and it even had a release date! Malcovich even confirmed his role as The Vulture, and about 24 hours later, the project was scrapped. It’s crazy how close the movie was to making!

We never got to see any costumes for the film, but they were in development and today we have a cool photo to share with you that features The Vulture’s wings and you can check them out below!

Before Tobey and Sam got their farewell from Sony, work on SPIDER-MAN 4 had actually started and I visited friends who were working on the Vulture costume for actor John Malkovich. Once production stopped, all materials were returned. I’ve been working on this for almost 15 years. pic.twitter.com/iY3VmzUrHI

— Ken Penders (@KenPenders) November 28, 2022

Previously speaking about the version of The Vulture we would see in the film, storyboard artist Jeffrey Henderson explained:

“The thing we kept coming back to was that, as a character, everyone would dismiss the Vulture as an old man in a silly green suit. So we wanted to go in the opposite direction and really make him the most fearsome and formidable adversary that Spider-Man has faced in the series.

Furthermore, Anne Hathaway was set to play The Vulturess, which would be an interesting new take on Felicia Hardy/Black Cat. Raimi also reportedly wanted to cast Bruce Campbell as Mysterio. It was explained, “It was going to be part of the film’s opening montage with a montage of C- and D-list villains we knew would never be used as the primary antagonists: Mysterio, the Shocker, the Prowler, the old-school-version with rhino onesie, maybe even trampoline, etc.”

As for why the film didn’t get made, Raimi explained earlier in a breakdown of why the film fell apart:

“It was really the most amicable, non-dramatic breakup — it was just that we had a deadline and I couldn’t make the story work to a degree that I wanted it to work. I was very unhappy with Spider-Man 3, and I wanted Spider-Man 4 ended on a very high note, the best Spider-Man of all, but I couldn’t get the script together in time, due to my own failures, and I said to Sony, “I don’t want to make a movie that isn’t great , so I think we shouldn’t be doing this movie. Go ahead with your reboot, which you have planned anyway.” And Amy Pascal said, “Thank you. Thanks for not wasting the studio’s money, and I appreciate your candor.” So we left on very good terms, both trying to do what was best for the fans, the good name of Spider-Man and Sony Studios.”

This is one of those big “what if it gets done” movie projects. It’s a shame it never happened, but Raimi has managed to work on another Marvel film with Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madnessand maybe one day he’ll work on another Spider-Man movie!