Drew Goddard was set to write and direct the Sinister Six movie, until a cyberattack snuffed it out — and led to the FBI swarming the Sony lot.

Project Hail Mary writer says the Sony hack killed his Spider-Man spinoff

Drew Goddard was set to write and direct the Sinister Six movie, until a cyberattack snuffed it out — and led to the FBI swarming the Sony lot.

By Derek Lawrence

Derek Lawrence

Derek Lawrence is a former associate editor at **. He left EW in 2022.

EW's editorial guidelines

March 19, 2026 5:43 p.m. ET

Leave a Comment

Jamie Foxx and Andrew Garfield in 'The Amazing Spider-Man 2.'. Credit:

Niko Tavernise/Sony

*Project Hail Mary** *screenwriter Drew Goddard is telling the story of his *Amazing Spider-Man* spinoff's demise — and it's like something straight out of a movie.

"I had a big Spider-Man movie about the Sinister Six go down because of the Sony hack," he said.

First announced in 2013, *The Sinister Six — *which would've set Spider-Man's deadliest adversaries against Andrew Garfield's version of Peter Parker — was cancelled following Sony's deal with Marvel that allowed the friendly neighborhood hero to appear in the MCU. But in Goddard's telling, the infamous 2014 cyberattack orchestrated by a group calling themselves the "Guardians of Peace" is really to blame.

Speaking to *Variety*, Goddard recalled law enforcement's response to the massive leak of confidential Sony Pictures data.

Drew Goddard attends the 'Project Hail Mary' world premiere.

Gareth Cattermole/Getty

"My office was right on the lot, and I saw the FBI swarm in and the helicopters fly over the studio,"

"I was sad about it," the *Cabin in the Woods* director said of *The Sinister Six*'s hack-related demise, "but there was literally nothing I could do to change the course of events. I suppose it was better than if they hadn't liked the script."

'The Matrix 5' movie will be produced by Lana Wachowski

Ryan Gosling's 'Project Hail Mary' crew made him 'mop friend' named Moppy Ringwald amid lonely shoot

Sony returned to the idea of uniting Spider-Man's nemeses with 2021's *Spider-Man: No Way Home*, a multiverse story featuring Willem Dafoe's Green Gobin, Alfred Molina's Doctor Octopus, Jamie Foxx's Electro, Rhys Ifans' Lizard, and Thomas Haden Church's Sandman. Meanwhile, Goddard pivoted from *The Sinister Six *to writing 2015's *The Martian*, which earned him an Oscar nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay.

Goddard previously said his take on the Sinister Six was "really fun."

"I wouldn't have done it had I not thought there was a real opportunity to do something different and exciting and just flat-out bananas," he told *The Hollywood Reporter *in 2018. "It was very much me and — a much more commercial version of — the *Cabin* mentality. The punk rock mentality that led to *Cabin* is very much at the core of* Sinister Six*."

***Get your daily dose of entertainment news, celebrity updates, and what to watch with our ******EW Dispatch newsletter******.***

Goddard returned to space (and adapting the work of author Andy Weir) for *Project Hail Mary*. Up next, he's writing and directing* Matrix 5,* the first film in the franchise not to hail from the Wachowskis.

"I can't say too much, because we're still in the stage of writing it," he told *Variety*. "I need to give myself space to find the best story. I think the approach will be the way I approach anything, which is, do I love it? And I love what Lana and Lilly Wachowski did with those movies. They mean so much to me and I feel like they've had a profound impact on my creative voice. I take this responsibility very seriously. I feel the weight of wanting to do right by the fans, wanting to do right by the creators and wanting to do right for myself as a fan."

*Project Hail Mary *opens in theaters March 20.

- Superhero Movies

Original Article on Source

Source: “EW Superhero”