Spider-Man Across The Spider-Verse has been a sensational success for Sony Pictures Animation, having surpassed a whopping US$500 million at the worldwide box office at the time of writing. However, it seems like things might not have been all rosy and perfect during production, as several animators who worked on the movie have come out and spoken out on alleged severe crunch and other issues.

According to the animators (via Vulture), over 100 artists and animators left before production ended and they sometimes had to work 11-hour-days, seven days a week. They also said that a lot of the crunch during production is due to how indecisive the movie’s writers/producers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller were, which led to countless revisions and edits that resulted in more work.

The sequel, Spider-Man Beyond The Spider-Verse, is slated to premiere in March 2024. However, the animators who worked on Spider-Man Across The Spider-Verse claimed that not much work has been done on the movie; since they had to focus all their efforts on Spider-Man Across The Spider-Verse. What this means is that the movie will very likely be delayed.

They said:

They’ve announced that Beyond the Spider-Verse will be released in March of next year. I’ve seen people say, “Oh, they probably worked on it at the same time.” There’s no way that movie’s coming out then. There’s been progress on the pre-production side of things.

But as far as the production side goes, the only progress that’s been made on the third one is any exploration or tests that were done before the movie was split into two parts. Everyone’s been fully focused on Across the Spider-Verse and barely crossing the finish line. And now it’s like, Oh, yeah, now we have to do the other one.

At the time of writing, Sony Pictures Animation has yet to officially respond to the crunch allegations or whether Spider-Man Beyond The Spider-Verse will be delayed. I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

In the meantime, check out my review of Spider-Man Across The Spider-Verse here, as well as the biggest cameos in the movie, my ending explained and post-credits scenes breakdown, and what to expect from Spider-Man Beyond The Spider-Verse.