While chatting with us about his new film The Martian, which he wrote the screenplay adaptation for of Andy Weir's book, filmmaker Drew Goddard also provides some details on his unproduced feature film version of The Sinister Six , a spin-off of Sony's now shelved Amazing Spider-Man franchise that was scrapped when the studio struck their Spidey deal with Marvel Studios.

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Goddard also dished a bit on Marvel's Daredevil (he scripted the first two episodes and helped steer the Netflix series overall direction in its first season) as well as rumors about a sequel to his film Cloverfield.For sure. I’ve always wanted to do a Spider-Man project and to come at it slightly different just felt right for me. I was really excited about that one, but who knows what the future holds. The allure of Peter Parker is strong…And they’re going to do a phenomenal job. Turns out Marvel knows what they’re doing.Which is good, for sure. I think Peter Parker is at his best when he’s dealing with high school problems. It makes him unique, especially in the Marvel Cinematic Universe right now, where there’s a lot of adults and a lot of Gods! The thing that makes Peter special is that he’s a kid.It’s a long game. It could still happen. It’s certainly not going to happen soon… but I’ve learned, look, Cabin in the Woods, we went into bankruptcy and had to stay on the shelf for a couple of years. It’s OK.Part of… but for me, the making of it is the special part. Then after that it’s the business part. Like, I want people to see these things, but it’s done. And with Sinister, you know I love that script, it was really fun. I love the artist I was working with. I’d love to make that movie someday. But if we don’t? I still got to write it. I still got to do it. And you can’t take that away from me, man.I know what you’re talking about and I agree. When you’re doing just a straightforward superhero movie, you don’t need a lot of villains. The focus is on one guy. I think with Sinister, it’s different. To me it's less about too many villains and more about too many antagonists and there’s a distinction. You never say, like, The Dirty Dozen has too many characters. They’re all villains, or you could argue that. But they’re protagonists. The trick with Sinister, is that I was making everyone the protagonist and less about six-on-one and more about coming at it a little differently. That was the idea.Right. You have to be true to it. You can still have protagonists be evil. That’s the secret. Look at something like, say, Reservoir Dogs. They’re protagonists but Michael Madsen is a complete psychopath! It’s OK, you can do both.I got a really good piece of advice when I was just starting out as a screenwriter, which was, whatever you’re working on, you will hear about three other things at the exact same time that sound exactly like your project – but don’t worry about it, because otherwise you’ll never get anything done. And I just always trust that we’ll make it unique. Things have cosmetic similarities.The Martian is a great example. I turned the first draft of this screenplay in the day Gravity opened and we all thought we were dead. Then we watched the movie, and I think Gravity is incredible, but we were like, ‘Oh, we’re different.’ And then Interstellar opened the day we started shooting… you keep having these moments that could stop you. But make your project unique and it’s fine.I love [Suicide Squad director] David Ayer. I think he makes spectacular movies. But David Ayer is a very different filmmaker than I am and it’s nice because then you think, well, he’s going to make his movie and it’ll shine but it’ll be different. They can all co-exist.One of the fun things is that there have been so many iterations over the years that you can just mix and match. And I can’t say who I ended up with, but that was the fun part, figuring that out.Not necessarily, no. I felt strongly that I wanted this movie to just stand on its own. I feel like, in general, I get tired of these movies where they’re becoming too much of a puzzle for people to solve. I’m like, no, just have fun.Maybe. I don’t know! Like, that’s the thing, we’ll find out… [laughs]Right. And the truth is, you can always adapt to fit what’s working. Marvel’s best movies are the ones that stand on their own, but also connect. You can do both.I thought Guardians [of the Galaxy]. Guardians and Joss’s Avengers are the ones, but look, there have been a lot of great movies. The first Iron Man is pretty off the charts great. But the thing about Joss and that first Avengers, I was like, I cannot believe what I’m seeing – talk about having a lot of protagonists, Jesus!I went into Marvel and talked to them about making it as a movie a couple of years ago, long after the Affleck movie. But what we all sort of realised is that, this movie doesn’t want to cost $200 million. The thing about Matt Murdock is, he’s not saving the world. He’s just keeping his corner clean. So it would feel wrong to have spaceships crashing in the middle of the city. But because of that, Marvel on the movie side is not in the business of making $25 million movies. They’re going big, as they should.It felt that we’d have more freedom to make it on the small screen and make it more adult. Look, if we took the Netflix [show] and put it in theatres, it’s rated R. And they’re not doing R-rated movies. And we also got to really explore the character. I feel like Netflix was the best possible home for that, otherwise you’d end up with a watered down version.Yeah, I’m not running the show any more, Doug Petrie and Marco Ramirez are, and they’re doing a phenomenal job. I get to go and play. All I can tell you is that if you liked Season 1, then Season 2 is going to blow your mind. They’re going big.And we’re able to do things on the small screen that fit that character better than if we had to water him down for the movies.No, there’s no plan. I think it’s one of those things we’d like to do one day but it’s not in the immediate future.They’re doing another but I’m not involved though I will be cheering along from the sidelines for sure. I can’t wait to see what happens!I’m just writing my next project on spec and hopefully I can convince someone to let me make it.You and me both, my friend!The Martian opens October 2nd.