The rumors were starting to reach the level of "where there's smoke, there's fire" and now the release date of "The Amazing Spider Man 3" was pushed back not by one year, but two years to 2018!

Obviously, there were signs of turmoil on the Sony front when the sequel "The Amazing Spider Man 2" became the least successful of the Spider Man franchise.

Based on numbers by Box Office Mojo, "TASM 2" raked in a full $ 700 million which is not bad for any movie, but the Super Hero movies' proverbial box office bar has been raised since the "Avengers" movie broke the billion dollar mark. It didn't help that the second installment of the reboot was bombed by the critics and was the least profitable among all five Spider Man movies (Spider Man 3, the most lambasted movie earned a mean $ 890 million).

The report was broken by The Hollywood Reporter:

 "Sony is entering the fray of comic-book super-teams.

The studio has dated The Sinister Six, a movie that features an all-star lineup of Spider-Man villains, for Nov. 11, 2016. As part of the move, Sony moved back its The Amazing Spider-Man 3 by two years to 2018. Amazing Spider-Man 3 and 4 had already been dated for June 10, 2016, and May 4, 2018, respectively."

While that is a very positive spin on the implications, it's hard to deny that Sony was displeased with the results of TASM 2 to say the least. But it is also true that Sony is high on Drew Goddard after his "Cabin in the Woods" work (under Joss Whedon).

Assembling a Super villain team is an innovation, but it is also the reality that Sony has to face since the Spider Man canon is all they have-and Spidey is not a team kind of hero. However, if there's someone to entrust an experimental, high-risk project, Goddard is the best guy.

The last word from Badass Digest:

"It seems weird for the villain movie to come out before the villains show up in the cinematic universe, but hey, Sony's been doing this reboot on their own (bad) terms all along. 

I trust Goddard. Here's hoping this works out for him."