The Dark Truth Behind The Spider-Verse Delays

March 29, 2024—the day Sony's 'Beyond the Spider-Verse' was supposed to hit cinemas. Nearly a year later, we still have NO INFORMATION on when it will be released. What happened? The more I dug, the more bizarre it got. Behind the scenes, this film has been plagued by extreme delays, brutal working conditions, and chaotic leadership that drove animators to their breaking point. And the truth? It’s even worse than you think. Let’s unravel the disaster that might just change the animation industry forever.

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00:00 Intro
0:46 Into The Spider-Verse Changed Everything
2:11 Sony's Confidence comes back to Bite Them
4:00 The Chaos Behind The Scenes
5:48 Employees Faced Financial & Job Insecurity
6:35 Animators were broken
7:28 Beyond The Spider-Verse is Nowhere Near Done
9:10 The Situation Keeps Getting Weirder..
9:58 This is The Dark Truth Behind The Chaos
10:58 How This Will Impact The Industry
12:24 Is The Spider-Verse Franchise Screwed?
12:51 Sony is in an IMPOSSIBLE Situation

[Fixen-yl]

Underpaying while earning hundreds of millions is crazy.

[Iamtheoriginal-Mvp]

Giving animators pressure instead of payment is the real problem

[theFILMNERD]

There was a 5 year gap between Into and Across, and Across still broke all records! I don´t feel like another big wait would hurt the third one!

[leavemealone]

The idea that "oh people will get tired of waiting" is what trully kills good art

[xalener]

they're learning why animated movies don't do sequel teases

[tanks]

As an animator, I need you all to know that this is not a problem that was not started by or exclusive to Sony or Phil Lord. The entire animation industry is in SHAMBLES right now. Studio execs and ego maniacs pile on work while massively underpaying and expect you to be grateful to have a job at all. All because THEY'RE the ones creating scarcity in the job market by constantly cutting positions. And once a production is over, you're never guaranteed another position. It's basically a nightmare gig economy with no unions. Within two years of working in the industry, I left to find a full-time design job elsewhere and I feel like I can BREATHE again. If we have any hope to salvage the industry and make masterpieces like the Spiderverse movies again, we need a total overhaul of the industry YESTERDAY.

[stevelandmartin-khan]

No movie is worth the horrid conditions these artists are put under. These movies aren’t made by Phil Lord, they’re made by the crew and animators, and they deserve more respect.

[gabrielraraujo]

I wouldn't mind waiting 10 years for the 3rd movie, if it meant that the people making this project were treated as human beings

[TheDracolordian]

It’s crazy how many things I love were made in terrible working conditions

[looniemoonie]

You also forgot to mention the genius behind the artstyle, Alberto Mielgo, got booted and had his work basically stolen/remade by Sony. He deserved better treatment, especially since the style is half of SpiderVerse' success.

[odeyana]

my excitement is fading off, not 'cause of delays, but hearing about bad working conditions

[aishahthecat]

Underpaying and overworking your employees is a recipe for failure. Rarely in the short term, but in the long run, Phil Lord and Sony mistreating their artists will come back to bite them

[MJCam]

The problem with having two phenomenal movies is that people expect the next movie to live up to them, and rightfully so, but that puts an insane amount of pressure on the people who work on it. I hope they take as much time as they need and treat everyone fairly.

[TheoremAtomPlayz]

I feel like people forget that Sony made a masterpiece at a cost of their workers. The workers should have received better working conditions and should have gotten humane working hours. I am really impressed with how the directors and producers wanted to take the spiderverse name to a whole nother world, but not caring about their conditions is just insane

[BikesNAlbums]

This is probably gonna be come a new meme. Instead of "We got this before GTA 6" its gonna be "We got this before beyond the spider verse"

[caboosefrfr]

When I watched the last movie in theaters and say the release date was just a few months away, I knew that would never happen.

[hata]

Guys, we can have both a quality product, and a quality work environment. THEY just need more time and money, not the execs

[roboket]

It’s terrible how one guys indecisiveness can ruin 100s of peoples lives

[RodrigoNogueira-di]

11 hours a day 7 days a week is inhuman, they should be ashamed of doing something like that to their artists

[nersama]

Sony is a Japanese company, and knowing the anime industry, it makes sense that they’ve been overworking the animators. I hope some new standards are set for animators. They bring life to entire universes and deserve to be treated as such