According to Deadline, the shortlist of potential filmmakers for the still-untitled reboot of the Spider-Man franchise in Marvel’s cinematic universe is down to six names. The directors rumored to be in the mix include Warm Bodies and 50/50 director Jonathan Levine, St. Vincent director Ted Melfi, Pitch Perfect director Jason Moore, Napoleon Dynamite director Jared Hess, and the two-person team of Vacation directors John Francis Daley and Jonathan M. Goldstein.
While the upcoming film will indeed start the franchise anew, it’s not expected to follow the typical origin story for the character, whose big-screen franchise was rebooted as recently as three years ago in The Amazing Spider-Man. Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige already indicated that the film will assume some familiarity with Peter Parker’s road to becoming Spider-Man, and that there’s been “a young kid [already] running around New York City in a homemade version of the Spider-Man costume” during the last few years of events transpiring in Marvel’s cinematic universe.
As for the tone of the film, the report suggests that Marvel is looking for “John Hughes humor and emotion, plus all the superhero stuff” in a story arc that the firm hopes will span multiple movies, each devoted to a year of high school for Peter Parker.
It’s worth noting that nowhere in the recently reported list of potential Spider-Man directors is Drew Goddard, the Cabin in the Woods filmmaker who was rumored in March to be the frontrunner for the job.
The new Spider-Man is expected to make his debut next year in Captain America: Civil War before starring in his own film, which is scheduled to hit theaters July 28, 2017.
