Ahoy, squirts! Quint here from the floor at Comic-Con. I just saw the SPIDER-MAN 3 presentation and had to tell you about.

Panel included Sam Raimi, Thomas Hayden Church, Kirsten Dunst, Tobey Maguire, Bryce Dallas Howard and Topher Grace. They teased us about not bringing footage, then finally unleashed upon us.

Guys, Venom is fucking great... Let's start with him...

The footage opened with Topher dipping his fingers, crossing himself in a church. He looks completely distraught, eyes red... he looks like life has beaten him down. His voice wavers and he prays. He's alone in the church. He asks God for his help. "It's Brock, sir. Edward B-brock Jr. (stutters) I'm here... humbled and humiliated... to ask you for one thing... I want you to kill Peter Parker." Then a bunch of stuff happened that I'll get to in a second. The trailer ended with Topher and Venom.

There was a montage of quick clips of Tobey Maguire at the top of the bell tower ripping the black suit off him. "I have to stop it." The SPIDER-MAN 3 logo comes up and you think that's it... but then we saw some unfinished effects of the symbiote dripping down, falling towards Topher Grace who is looking up. One drop falls and hits his right hand, immediately wrapping around his hand. The bulk of the symbiote hits him and wraps around him, pulling him to the ground, totally engulfing him. A cut and the camera is low to the ground a good distance away. It Raimi-cams EVIL DEAD style towards the black bulking mass. As it gets near the mass, Venom's head whips up looking straight into camera, which doesn't slow down and ends up rushing into his mouth where it goes to black.

Venom's face. Exactly what you want to see. Big, big toothy mouth, bright white eyes. Looks just like the later McFarlane Venom face.

The design looks great, Topher was great in the church sequence as Brock... Count me totally psyched... I'm updating this story with the rest of the footage, but wanted to share the Venom stuff right away! Stay tuned!

Okay, here's the rest. The footage started with Peter looking at himself in a mirror, he slowly parted his shirt revealing the black suit underneath. There were lots of quick shots, including James Franco chasing Spider-Man between the buildings, swinging what looked like a long sword at him. The majority of the effects were rough and unfinished and almost all the Harry Osborn stuff was very rough. If the rough animation is any indicator, he'll be wearing mostly black with some green around his hands and face.

There may be some spoilers here, so be careful.

I might be misinterpreting this, but you know the shot in the trailer that looks like James Franco had a pumpkin bomb lobbed at him? I think Peter throws it. There was a series of shots with voice over talking about regret and doing things you shouldn't. There was that shot from the trailer and a shot of Parker looking pissed off, mask off, but black suit on. He's standing in the hallway, Franco's on the floor and it really does look like he tosses the bomb. There's a shot later of James Franco being loaded onto a stretcher, neck brace on.

There was some Sandman stuff. Rough effects, again, of Spidey punching Sandman's face, part of his mouth flying off in particles (sand). The rough animation had his skeletal structure underneath, but that could all be for reference. There was also a shot of Sandman with his giant hammer hand whooping the shit out of Spider-Man, sending him flying off camera... That's what I remember the most from the footage... besides that awesome Venom footage... The panel went on.... more on that in a moment...

THE PANEL:

- The biggest slip at the panel come from Kirsten Dunst, who just loves to spit out spoilers. She was asked by a young girl which villain would she enjoy being kidnapped by the most. Kirsten "ummm..." and "aaahhh..."ed a few times. Topher cleared his throat, loudly. She goes, "You totally just gave something away!" The audience laughs and Topher repeats the question, "Who WOULD you want to be captured by?" Whoops. So, it's safe to assume Eddie or Venom abducts MJ in the movie. Thanks, Kirsten.

- Topher Grace grew up a huge fan of the SPIDER-MAN books and in particular loves the McFarlane era Venom. He likes that Eddie is Peter's doppelganger even before the whole Venom/Spidey "two different sides of the same coin" relationship comes in.

- Raimi was begged to give something up about the origin of the symbiote, but he wouldn't say. He did say that he wanted to keep the film grounded in a sort of real world and that he was avoiding the cosmic, which would make me think it's not going to be an alien. Raimi wanted to keep it a secret until it came out.

- Raimi was asked about the music, and specifically about Christopher Young and why Danny Elfman left. Raimi responded saying he wanted Elfman to return to score the film and that he really hoped Young and Elfman would team up together, Young assisting. He give a lot of credit to Danny Elfman and feels he's a big part of the universe.

- Regarding Harry Osborn. Riami said he is NOT Green Goblin II and he is NOT Hobgoblin, but something else. He wouldn't say any more than he is still very upset about his father's death and he does use his father's technology to go after Spider-Man.

- Thomas Hayden Church was asked about his previous roles in films like SIDEWAYS and comparing them to his role in SPIDER-MAN 3. He responded, "Strangely enough in SIDEWAYS I was also made of sand..."

- Church also talked about Raimi as a director: "Sam is nurturing, even offering his breast at the time... you know, if I was hungry and the food was too far away..."

- Raimi played around a bit with Church, but said something very heartfelt and genuine. He said that Church brought a very real amount of humanity to the role of Sandman. He's not just your typical villain in this movie.

- The Sandman poster seems to prove that. I should have a glimpse for you soon, but it was shown in the same batch that the Peter Parker and Eddie Brock ones on this page were. Sandman's poster was of him standing tall, on the New York streets, back to us. His legs are sand piles, his hands sand and he looks like he's ready to fight with his right hand, but his left is protectively holding a little girl behind him. He's protecting her from something, something he's facing and we can't see.

- Other posters shown: Gwen Stacey (strangely enough, in a class room with Doc Conners in the background), Kirsten Dunst looking all sexy and caught in jet black webbing and the two you see on this page.

- Is Bruce Campbell in the movie? Sam: "I can't keep Bruce outta these movies!" So, still no denial.. maybe that Mysterio rumor has something to it...

- What about EVIL DEAD remake? Sam says he dropped it when dealing with SPIDER-MAN 3, but might pick it up again when he finishes.

- Topher let something go... Venom won't be completely CGI. He said it took him 45 minutes just to get into his suit and 4 1/2 hours in make-up, he said. Very interesting, says I.

- Regarding the high number of villains, Raimi said that they all come about due to the story. They aren't just wallpaper. They each have a real reason for being in there, dramatically. He wouldn't go any deeper than that.

- Why Venom, after Raimi has said he doesn't care for the character? He said Avi Arad brought it up, saying this is the 3rd film and, pretty much, Raimi shouldn't be greedy. So, Raimi consented for the fans, but said that after seeing what Alvin Sargent did with him in the script he started to really take to the character. Then when he saw what Topher Grace brought to it, he fell in love with the character. "I may be the latest and last Venom fan..."

- Topher talks about being called in for a meeting. No one told him why, just to meet at Sony. He showed up and there was Sam Raimi, Avi Arad and some others. He said he thought, 'I know what this is,' but then he wasn't SPIDER-MAN... so...

- Some more funny stuff: some guy came up to the mic wearing a giant blue, red and yellow Superman symbol t-shirt. He was asking his question and Raimi said, "What's that on your shirt? Is that the new SPIDER-MAN symbol? I've been seeing that everywhere!"

- Tobey Maguire was asked about how the black suit affects Peter Parker in the film and he was very non-committal, but said that Parker will "acting shockingly."

- Finally, the question was asked, "Is this the last one?" Tobey answered the question saying that they tie up a lot of threads in this one, but don't completely close the door. As long as there are good stories to tell, he thinks they'll be there to tell them.

That's it on the SPIDER-MAN 3 presentation. I'll have some new pics from the panel up here soon, so keep checking back. I'll also have an interview I did with a certain hot blonde and a certain director who is going to be watching over the... something... Plus an update to my GRINDHOUSE coverage and my 300 coverage. Be back soon!

-Quint
quint@aintitcool.com