Sinister Six

If there’s one thing we’ve learned from our years on the Internet, it’s that there’s no aspect of comics that can’t be broken down and quantified in a single definitive list, preferably in amounts of five or ten. And since there’s no more definitive authority than ComicsAlliance, we’re taking it upon ourselves to compile Top Five lists of everything you could ever want to know about comics. Good guys team up for unity and power to achieve the greater good in superhero comics all the time. Superhero teams are one of the surest and most frequent tropes in cape comics, both mainstream, independent, and small press. Bad guys, on the other hand, are perhaps a little less likely to trust each other enough to form some kind of...squad? But that doesn't mean there isn't still a host of cool supervillain teams worth our time and attention. This cool list of cool stuff is here to count down and celebrate the best of the baddest.

Ah, our old friend, the Spider-Man cinematic universe. It seems like just yesterday that pundits were absolutely certain that the upcoming box office success of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 would lead to separate Venom and Sinister Six spin-offs. Then Marvel swooped in with their darn Captain America: Civil War and the future of Spider-Man seemed back up in the air.

Superhero movies are a dominant force in modern blockbuster cinema, but with so many heroes appearing on our screens it can be tough to keep up with the release calendar. To help make it a little easier for superhero fans to know which weekends to keep free over the next few years, designer Dylan Todd has created this infographic featuring all the upcoming releases from Marvel Studios, Fox, Sony, Warner Bros and more, starring characters from the DC Universe, the Marvel Universe, the X-Men books, Power Rangers, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the Valiant Universe, and more.

Let’s take a brief memory-trip back to the time before last year’s big Sony hack, when the studio had a lot of ambitious and sort of messy plans to rescue their Spider-Man franchise from itself. In addition to potential spinoffs (including an all-female movie and rumors of an Aunt May film), Sony was also planning a Sinister Six film with Drew Goddard writing and directing. Goddard’s project was the only real promising Spidey spinoff of the bunch, and it turns out that it might still see the light of day.

Last year, back when it still seemed possible that Sony may try to continue their Amazing Spider-Man reboot and before they teamed with Marvel to relaunch Spidey in a new film series that will connect with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, ScreenCrush Editor-in-Chief Mike Sampson and I put together a list of ten directors we thought could save the Spider-Man franchise. One name we both immediately thought belonged on the list was Drew Goddard, the man who directed The Cabin in the Woods and was then slated to direct the Amazing 2 spinoff The Sinister Six.

We always suspected this day would come; our Supermovies Infographic is actually shrinking. The announcement of a new deal between Sony and Marvel over the Spider-Man movies, which sees Spider-Man integrated into the Marvel Cinematic Universe but still under Sony's control, has not only bumped a lot of release dates back to avoid a Marvel/Sony showdown, but has also pushed at least a couple of films off the chart completely.

After the news that Marvel and Sony had come to an agreement to co-produce a new series of Spider-Man movies, while also introducing the character into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, one of the items we immediately turned our attention to was Sony's planned Sinister Six spinoff, which was deep into development and was teased all through last summer’s Amazing Spider-Man 2. Director Drew Goddard (The Cabin in the Woods) had been working on the film since last year (he even left Netflix’s Daredevil series to focus on it) with a November 2016 release date planned. The future of that film seemed very tenuous this morning following the big announcement, but now comes news that the film is still in development at Sony.

It’s been a really rough time for Sony as the studio’s e-mails and sensitive materials have been hacked by a mysterious group, and confidential details have been leaking left and right. The latest pieces of information picked up from Sony’s hacked internal e-mails have to do with Spider-Man—a character that’s in a bit of flux right now as Sony has been trying to sort out what to do next following the critical and commercial disappointment of ‘Amazing Spider-Man 2.’ As it turns out, Sony has indeed spoken with Marvel about a potential crossover, and that’s not all they’ve been planning to salvage the character.

Each weekday, ComicsAlliance brings you a carefully selected variety of links from around the web about comics and comics-related media, including movies, video games, toys, and whatever else might be worth noting. Quite frankly, these are items you may just need to know about to have a productive day. Take a look at today's hand-picked links after the jump.

Each weekday, ComicsAlliance brings you a carefully selected variety of links from around the web about comics and comics-related media, including movies, video games, toys, and whatever else might be worth noting. Quite frankly, these are items you may just need to know about to have a productive day. Take a look at today's hand-picked links after the jump.