As The Amazing Spider-Man 2 approaches its release date in less than a month Sony Pictures is intensifying their plans to put out a Spidey-related feature each year (as we reported here) by finally signing a director for their Sinister Six spin-off movie that would focus on an epic teaming of the Marvel-ous web-slingin’ superhero’s greatest villains.

Back in December it was revealed that Cabin in the Woods director Drew Goddard had come on board to write and potentially direct the film. Now it looks as if Goddard is officially being given the director’s chair on the still-gestating project which may not see a theatrical release until after The Amazing Spider-Man 3, which is set to open on June 10, 2016.

Shailene Woodley is one of the driving forces of Divergent‘s box office success. And with the film already being a box office smash, it’s no surprise that the actress opted to continue to be that driving force and leave her role as Mary Jane in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 behind. Or so we thought.

Last year, Sony had announced that there would at least two more Amazing Spider-Man sequels hitting theaters. Not including the spin-off films. Originally Mary Jane was supposed to be a cameo in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, which would lead to a much larger role in The Amazing Spider-Man 3. But director Marc Webb decided to streamline the story to focus on Peter and Gwen’s relationship, and decided to cut the cameo. Now Woodley has come out to talk about her decision to leave the role as MJ. Hit the jump to read more and see a video of Woodley talking about Spider-Man.

There’s the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and then there’s everything else. For everything that falls under the latter, Sony and Fox are trying to establish their own cinematic universes and keep a tight grip on their respective Marvel properties. Sony already has plans to build a universe around the new Amazing Spider-Man franchise by launching spinoff films, while Fox is creating a world around X-Men and Fantastic Four, with the possibility of the two merging into one universe.

With Sony already working on spinoffs, the studio will have to look into finding a new director after The Amazing Spider-Man 3, as it has been confirmed that director Marc Webb will leave the franchise after the trilogy. On the X-Men side of things, The Wolverine director James Mangold confirms that he will begin shooting the tentatively titled The Wolverine 2 after X-Men: Apocalypse. Hit the jump for more.

Sony intends to hold on to the Spider-Man rights as long as it can. Yes, releasing sequels will help their cause. Releasing spinoff films would too. But a new move made by the studio shows just how desperate they are to keep the property in their hands.

Now tell me if you haven’t heard this one before. Disney distributes around two to three Marvel movies a year. After 2015, they also plan to distribute one or two Star Wars films. A report from Variety says that Sony is jumping on the bandwagon by planning to release at least one Spider-Man film (character or spinoff) a year. This is not a good thing by any stretch of the imagination.

It came as a huge surprise to every Spider-Man fan when it was announced that there would be two more Amazing Spider-Man films to come out after the upcoming sequel. It became apparent that Sony was trying to establish a world that Marc Webb had created, and thus began the Sinister Six speculation. It made a lot of sense considering that two more films would be more than enough to set up that world and build up to one of the greatest threats that the webslinger has faced in his hero tenure.

But being signed on for The Amazing Spider-Man 4 film is all news to Andrew Garfield, who claims “I’m under contract for another one after this. As far as a fourth one”¦ that’s not anything to do with me.” Which is strange, because news of there being two more Spider-Man films being released in the future – the third is due out in 2016, with the fourth due out two years after – has been out for a while.