Update: Josh Hutcherson IS Spider-Man - Depending On Who You Ask!
Thu, July 1, 2010 
UPDATE: Not surprisingly, there's been some conflicting info on this puppy. Thankfully, it's not in the bullshit "Nu-uh!" fashion. No, professionals are doing their homework and checking with their own source(s).
CHUD is hearing from their moles Josh Hutcherson "has not yet been offered the part." Not that it's out of the question, but "there is no solid casting of Hutcherson" as of yesterday morning. Further rumors they're hearing peg the young actor to follow in the footsteps on a different Marvel superhero in need of recasting – that of Scott Summers/Cyclops in Matthew Vaughn's X-Men: First Class.
On the other end of the spectrum, Entertainment Weekly reached Sony for comment to no avail. Their internal peeps, on the other hand, say Hutcherson is "the guy for the job." To be fair, they were the first ones to report on Marc Webb being in contention to helm the reboot days before others claiming so themselves. Like I said, we'd heard the kid had the role locked a couple of months ago. But this whole matter is causing nothing but headaches (or explosions) among us nerds.
So I fully expect to hear yet another actor in the running before all of this is said and done. Maybe Sony will come out and officially unveil the new web-slinger at Comic-Con in a few weeks like some have speculated?
As of late, Josh Hutcherson (while making the press-rounds for The Kids Are All Right) publicly acknowledged his candidacy as the new Spider-Man for the Marc Webb-helmed reboot. Nine times out of ten when an actor openly admits to being up for an as-yet-cast role, it translates to "I didn't get it."
Not unlike our pal George "El Guapo" Roush of Latino Review, word reached us Sony had settled on the young actor as the newly teenaged web-slinger. But there were definitely signs of trouble when Warner Brothers came out and announced they were fast-tracking a Journey to the Center of the Earth sequel for September 2011 release with production set to start this fall. It certainly looked like Hutcherson had been contractually cock-blocked from the role. But that doesn’t appear to be the case.
As Blue Sky Disney exclusively reports:
"Your friendly, rebooted Spider-Man in the flesh. Word from my Bothans is that Sony has settled on "Journey to the Center of the Earth's" Josh Hutcherson as the newly, high school bound Peter Parker. After several extensive test shoots were performed, Marc Webb and the top Sony $uits decided that Hutcherson was the right fit for the role and an offer was made and has been accepted. Now I wonder who'll be cast as the Lizard?"
I know plenty will bitch and moan about Josh because he doesn't 100% look the part already. Let the history books show, Christopher Reeve didn't look a thing like Superman back in 1977. But talent won out and he was simply made to look the part (i.e. getting into shape and that famous picture of director Richard Donner literally taking shoe-polish to dye his hair black for a screen-test).
This is the first re-assuring sign for a film (and franchise, no less) in trouble ever since the controversial cancelling of Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 4 and the almost-instantaneous reboot announcement.
Reader Comments (6)
I figured a lot of ppl behind the scenes obviously knew about this already, as all of you kept saying my bet is hutcherson, so I'm not really all that shocked by this
this sounds great! I actually think he looks a lot like Parker
Yeah I agree with Dave I figured this for a while now... Hutherson will do ok as long as he beefs up some
We interviewed Josh last year at the Scream 2009 Awards about Red Dawn -- you can watch that interview here:
http://coin-op.tv/?p=1818
I seriously doubt you knew about this before hand. Too many bloggers claim shit like that after a larger outlet reports it. ohhhh we already knew that, but we couldn't talk about. yeah ok BS
You again? You're coming over here and saying WE don't know what we're talking about. Irony. It's real, and it's posting ridiculous comments on ThinkMcflyThink.com