Silver and Black director Gina Prince-Bythewood has provided a brief, but helpful, update on where the film is at in pre-production. One of multiple films based around Spider-Man anti-heroes and/or reformed villains that Sony has in the pipeline right now,
Silver & Black is the only one after this fall's
Venom to be granted a release date so far. However, at this point, it's safe to assume that Sony will eventually move the movie back from its current February 2019 theatrical launch date, seeing as
Silver & Black has yet to progress past the script development stage.
Described as a buddy adventure that pairs mercenary Silver Sablinova with law-breaker Felicia Hardy,
Silver & Black has passed through the hands of several noteworthy writers by now. In addition to Prince-Bythewood, Chris Yost (
Thor: Ragnarok) and
Westworld co-creator Lisa Joy have written script drafts for
Silver & Black in the past, as have Geneva Robertson-Dworet (
Tomb Raider) and Lindsey Beer, the cowriter of the upcoming YA adaptation
Chaos Walking and a member of the
Godzilla vs. Kong writers room. Prince-Bythewood, for her part, is focused on getting a great script locked in place for the film, above all else.
The
Silver & Black movie will be Prince-Bythewood's second time playing in the Marvel sandbox, following her efforts directing the pilot for next month's Freeform TV series,
Marvel's Cloak & Dagger (which she's also an executive producer on).
Screen Rantinterviewed the filmmaker on the press circuit for
Cloak and Dagger, and the topic of
Silver and Black naturally came up. Prince-Bythewood essentially reiterated what she wrote on
Twitter back in February - when reports first surfaced that
Silver & Black has been indefinitely delayed - and told us that for now, her focus is on getting the movie's script pitch-perfect:
"The update is just really pounding out the script. It all starts with the script. You gotta have a great script so we want to make sure that's right before we jump in."
Although Sony has several Spider-Man spinoff films in development - ranging from
Silver & Black to Spike Lee's sci-fi superhero romp
Nightwatch and even a
Morbius the Living Vampire movie - there's no guarantee that any of them will happen, should
Venom under-perform at the box office this October. Sony has already tried its hand at a Spider-Man cinematic universe once before and failed, back when it attempted to spinoff
Sinister Sixand
Venom movies from
The Amazing Spider-Man series four years ago. The studio has all the more reason to proceed with caution this time around - meaning, the reception to
Venom will have a big impact on the future of the franchise (as well it should).
Venom aside, there are plenty of other reasons for Prince-Bythewood to take her time and fine-tune the
Silver & Black script before starting production. Many a tentpole before it has unwisely charged into filming without locking the screenplay firmly into place, and these movies based on secondary roster Spider-Man characters (like
Silver & Black) are risky enough even with a great script in hand. As it were, Prince-Bythwood's great track record speaks for itself (see
Love and Basketball,
Secret Life of Bees,
Beyond the Lights) and is all the proof one needs to trust her judgment about when
Silver & Black will be ready to roll camera.
