If you've been holding your breath for "Spider-Man 4," I hope you've already heard the news that you might as well exhale now, because the fourth flick in the Spidey franchise is on hold for script revisions. Sam Raimi, the director of the first two excellent "Spider-Man" movies and also that third one, is reportedly having script problems with number four, and conflicts with Sony execs over John Malkovich as the Vulture, which Raimi seems to want pretty damn bad.

Although originally planned for a prime release date on May 6th, it looks like they've already blown that date -- which was quickly snapped up by the "Thor" flick and the new "Pirates of the Caribbean." Personally, I"m ok with the delay; I'd rather wait a little while and see this done right, because it's not like world really needs another "X-Men 3" or "Spider-Man 3" or "entire Fantastic Four franchise," you know?

Meanwhile, Movieline has posted a set of "leaked" script notes between a Sony exec and Raimi that's obviously a parody, but not a bad way to twiddle your thumbs as "Spider-Man 4" burns in production hell behind you. There are stabs at Raimi's love of setting Spidey action to sunny musical numbers, an attempt to blatantly rip off "Avatar," and the insertion of a new villain named the "Meddler" who bears a startling resemblance to someone at Sony.

STUDIO NOTES SM4 01/02/10 DRAFT

pg 1. Still not convinced opening with a musical number is the way to go. But I know that SR loved the musical Peter Parker bit in SM3 and thinks that starting on one here makes the bus hijacking by the terrorist (Hungarian! not Al Qaeda, too sensitive!) a real sucker-punch. The execution isn't there. "Walkin' On Sunshine," really? If we're gonna do it, we can do better. Taylor Swift better. Let me worry about the licensing.

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pg 12. Having J.Jonah scream that Peter should "go start a blog" if he doesn't like the low price for his photos feels stale. Consider "go tweet a Twitter." Dbl check, but I think that's what they say.

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