Last week, Vulture released a jaw-dropping article detailing the working conditions animators had to endure to make Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse—jaw-dropping, but unfortunately not surprising. In the U.S. and many places abroad, the animation industry isn’t exactly known for its excellent work conditions, but a horrendous “industry standard” is no excuse for taking advantage of human beings and putting them through work hell. Reading this account, which includes a very damning quote about the progress on the third film from one of the animators, makes you seriously doubt that Beyond the Spider-Verse is coming out next year.
Across the Spider-Verse was a grueling process for those involved, where the finished picture (“final renders”) had to be dismantled and re-done up to five times. If you’re like me, you probably assumed that Across the Spider-Verse and Beyond the Spider-Verse were in production at the same time. But it turns out all resources went into making Across once it was decided that the story would be split into two movies. In the Vulture article, an animator says the final film is only in pre-production.
In other words, you might want to start adjust expectations on whether Beyond the Spider-Verse is actually coming out next year—and join those calling for a delay that allows for a reasonable work schedule for animators.
The conditions for Spider-verse animators
Just how bad were conditions? Vulture’s report detailed them like this: Producer Phil Lord “tinkered” with the movie for six months, during which production stayed idle against a ticking deadline. Animators then reportedly worked “11 hours a day, seven days a week, for more than a year.” 100 of the 1,000 artists who worked on the project quit due to the conditions. Yet more wanted to quit, but stayed on in order to have their credited work make it to the finished film (“if it gets changed, it’s no longer yours”). Salaries were “lowballed” so that animators would rely on the overtime to make a living wage.
If you’re curious about what the studio has to say about this, Amy Pascal, former Sony Pictures Entertainment chairperson and a producer on all three Spider-Verse films, gave rebuttals to the animators’ testimony in the Vulture piece, and Pascal’s rebuttals are very bad. “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,” she said. The story further quotes her, “To the workers who felt demoralized by having to revise final renders five times in a row, the Spider-Verse producer says, ‘I guess, Welcome to making a movie.'”
It is precisely that attitude of considering artists severely overworking themselves—often to the point of exhaustion and/or burnout—a normal part of the filmmaking process that needs to change. Overwork isn’t something to be normalized—or worse, glorified as something only certain individuals can handle. It’s something to be revised so that a studio’s employees can lead healthy lives.
We want to believe that if a film looks beautiful, as Spider-Verse certainly does, that means the people who worked on it were treated well and supported in doing their best work. But that’s rarely the case. One animator, going by the pseudonym of Stephen, spoke to this conundrum perfectly.
I do genuinely think it’s a good movie. But that being said, it’s been debilitating for a lot of the artists involved. Morale was incredibly low, and a lot of people reassessed if this was even something they wanted to be a part of. It’s this perpetual emotional give-and-take that’s very stressful; it absolutely affects people’s lives, sleep schedules, energy levels, their burnout. The frustrating thing is at the end of the day the work is good. There’s a lot of high praise that comes out of it. So there’s this rollercoaster of emotions where you go through hell but it makes people happy. And it makes you happy that people are happy. And you want to do it again.
“Stephen,” via Vulture
Will Beyond the Spider-Verse be delayed?
Now, you might wonder how all of this affects the third film, Beyond the Spider-Verse. That film is currently slated for a release March 29, 2024. Will conditions improve? Or will they be worse because of the tight deadline?
Unfortunately, the latter seems more likely. In the words of one animator anonymously interviewed for the Vulture piece:
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.
“Stephen,” via Vulture
So, basically, animation had not started on Beyond the Spider-Verse as of May 2023, when “Stephen” talked to Vulture. Pre-production was not even done—note that he merely said there was “progress.” And yet, May 2023 is 10 months out from Beyond’s supposed release date.
By contrast, there were five years between Into and Across the Spider-Verse. NME reported that Into the Spider-Verse took 800 animators four years to make. Across had 1,000—but already lost 100, and who knows what retention will be like, given these working conditions. The Spider-Verse films contain the most technically impressive feats in Western animation in recent memory. These artists not only need time to pull these feats off—they deserve it. Give them that time.
I know it would be a bummer if Beyond the Spider-Verse were pushed back—let’s be realistic here—two or three years. At least. But given how stunning these films are, do you really want to see a version of the grand finale crammed into only a 10-month production cycle? Or 8-month, assuming they worked on Across right up to June 2? Especially given that stunted production cycle means the animators involved will have to work in even more extreme conditions than they went through on Across? Would it even be possible?
I’d rather see Beyond the Spider-Verse as far out as even 2027 than see a hastily rushed-through version made by exploited, exhausted artists.
(featured image: Sony Pictures Entertainment)
