Earlier in the week, we reported the problems that Sony was having with the production of Spider-Man 4, which is currently on hold while script issues are resolved. You can read the piece here, but the gist is that director Sam Raimi isn't seeing eye to eye with Sony over the choice of villain, and it seems that the project is still some way from going before the cameras.

One consequence of that is that, even though Sony hasn't surrendered the lucrative May 6th 2011 release slot for the film that it had planned, it's looking very unlikely that it's got any chance of hitting it.

Rival studios have been reading the runes well on this one, and even though Sony hasn't confirmed that Spider-Man 4 is relinquishing its release date, everybody else hasn't been hanging around awaiting what seems like the inevitable announcement.

Thus, Paramount has confirmed that it's bringing the release of its own Marvel movie, Thor, forward to May 6th. Thor was originally down to be released on May 20th 2011, but that date has now been seized by Disney, who will be unleashing Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides at that point.

Our best guess for Spider-Man 4 is that it'll end up in July or something like that. But given how busy the summer of 2011 is looking, it's going to struggle to secure itself a decent slot.