‘Across The Spider-Verse’ Animators Come Forward On Poor Working Conditions

SONY’s second animated outing of their Miles Morales Trilogy has been sweeping up the box office over the past couple of weeks. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse currently sits at $512.6 Million worldwide on a $100 Million budget. The film has even garnered much praise from both audiences and critics, with a 96% critical score and 95% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes.



However, a new story suggests that not everyone was celebrating when the film finally reached cinemas as many former animators of the film recently came forward regarding the working conditions when making the film.

In a recent report from The Vulture, multiple anonymous animators came forward to discuss the subject. According to them, the film’s production was “unsustainable” and “erratic” and that it was largely a result of producer Phil Lord (Part of the duo Lord & Miller) who would request last-minute changes and would override the film’s three directors.



As a result of the conditions, roughly 100 of the 1000+ animators hired to work on the film left before production wrapped, resulting in some being “pushed to work more than 11 hours a day, seven days a week” in certain cases.

One of the animators spoke about the behind-the-scenes issues between the directors and Lord when it came to the final approval of certain shots:

“They are obviously in charge of directing, but if Phil has a note that contradicts their note, his note takes precedence. They have to do what Phil says. So there were constant changes and cuts. With Phil Lord, nothing is ever final or approved. Nothing was really set in stone. Nothing was ever done. Everything was just endlessly moving beneath our feet because they wanted it to be the best that it could be.“



Another animator spoke on how multiple scenes that were almost fully rendered had to be changed due to Lord apparently struggling with visualizing 3D animation in its earliest stages, and that production at their Vancouver office had to be put on hold for 3 months.

“The worst thing you can do to an artist is hire them and then tell them to do nothing. These people were like, ‘How do you expect us to make this huge movie in less and less time?’ Each week that went by idle meant that later on, it was going to be more insane.“

Shortly after these claims came out, fellow Across the Spider-Verse producer Amy Pascal respond by issuing the following statement:

“One of the things about animation that makes it such a wonderful thing to work on is that you get to keep going until the story is right. If the story isn’t right, you have to keep going until it is. To the workers who felt demoralized by having to revise final renders five times in a row, I guess, welcome to making a movie.“



Whether you agree with her statement or not it is never a good look if there is potential friction between the directors and producers of a project, regardless of the end result. 

Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse is currently set for a March 2024 release. But given the multiple delays the second film had, it is reasonable to assume that the date may change.

Source: The Verge