Kraven the Hunter Director Addresses Whether Spider-Man Universe Stumbles Are Impacting the Film

Sony’s Spider-Man Universe hasn’t exactly been living up to its potential. The Spider-Man spin-off films have had a lot of failures, and that’s been a huge problem. Spider-Man has been a guaranteed moneymaker for decades, so Sony’s fumbling of Spider-Man-related movies is pretty mystifying. Kraven the Hunter is the next installment in Sony’s Spider-Man Universe, and it promises to bring some good old-fashioned ultra-violence to Sony’s Spider-Man films. However, the bad reputation of Sony’s Spider-Man universe is hanging over the film. In an interview with ComicBook, Kraven the Hunter director J.C. Chandor talked about how the mixed reception of those films affected his film, revealing that the various directors worked together, and asking fans to give his new movie a chance.

“I don’t want to get too into the nitty gritty of it, but here’s what I would say: for me as a filmmaker, my number one goal, especially, quite frankly, over the last couple of years where you guys are deep in this world … some of the fans out there, a lot of the fans, were upset with certain decisions and certain outcomes [of Sony’s Spider-Man Universe],” Chandor shared with ComicBook about the franchise’s reception so far. “Then with other films, they’ve gone on to be tremendous successes. So there’s been there’s been a mixed success rate. People have got to give us a chance and come out and support this film, and literally try to wash away some of the other stuff that’s happened. Give our film a chance.”

He continued, “And I think they’ll realize that we’ve done everything we can to give them a pretty fun story. You’ll see when the movie’s over, there’s potential for a lot of things to happen. But my goal was to isolate our movie, protect it, and just tell a good damn story. And then we’ll have opportunities to do a lot of fun things.”

Kraven the Hunter has a lot riding on it. Madame Web was a huge disappointment with audiences and critics and Venom: The Last Dance got a combined gross of $436.6 million worldwide, with only a $128.1 million coming from the U.S. Kraven the Hunter has some hype behind it, but if it’s not a success, the Sony Spider-Man Universe is going to have to go back to the drawing board. Chandor has a lot of faith in his film, though, teasing how much potential it has to make things better.

Kraven the Hunter releases on December 13th.