So, Comic-Con is where Sam Raimi and Columbia Pictures finally decided to confirm that Venom was the second villain in Spider-Man 3, which is something that comes as no surprise as Kirsten Dunst let us know that a long while back, but the audience was also treated to some special footage of Venom (click here for more on that) and I was treated to interview time with director Sam Raimi, Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst.

They did keep their cards close to their chest but for any Spider-Man fan this is a must read. Check out the interview below:

Question: Do you have big news?

Sam Raimi: Yes, there's a big announcement. The big villain will be Venom. He's coming to star across from Tobey as the villain along with Thomas Haden Church who plays The Sandman. That's what we're revealing today.

Kirsten Dunst: These guys are like we already knew that. I thought I let that out of the bad a while ago? (that story here)

Sam Raimi: You did...

Question: Why did you decide to bring Venom in?

Sam Raimi: Avi Arad said you've had two Spider-Man pictures and there are so many kids who want to see Venom. So he said why don't you give the kids what they've been waiting for since you've got a villain you love in Sandman.

Question: How different will he be from what we've seen Venom look like before?

Sam Raimi: We studied all the different looks and we tried to take the ones we thought would work for us but also the ones Avi thought were the most classic elements.

Question: How do you make a character like Venom realistic in the Spider-Man world you've created?

Sam Raimi: That's a good question. There are a lot of fantastic elements about Venom that you could say are in conflict with the realism we wanted to have in the picture. But we just said Kirsten and Toby you'll just have to do the heavy lifting here to bring us back down to Earth because he's this wild goofball from outer space.

Question: So he's from outer space then?

Sam Raimi: I never said that, sir. What are you talking about?

Question: Tobey is the new costume different for you?

Tobey Maguire: Not really. Pretty much the same. I mean yeah what it feels like and the materials are similar. It might be a little sleeker and sexier, kind of like me in real life.

Question: How do you juggle a third villain and a love triangle?

Sam Raimi: Well Spider-Man comic books had all these characters and successfully interwove the stories. A lot of what we're doing is not introducing elements like if Harry Osborn does decide to seek vengeance it's certainly something that's been set up. So we have less work to do in that sense. And one of the villains we've tried to interweave into Peter Parker's life and in a way that could give us insight into the first two pictures. Probably only with the Brock character is there an introduction to a whole new character but that's okay because he can meet new people too.

Question: What has changed with your character Kirsten?

Kirsten Dunst: For Mary Jane she's still an actress, you could see what it was heading towards with Peter. I'm much more mature and a lot more is at stake because of their relationship, they're together. Is that okay Sam? There's a lot more at stake for all the characters.

Question:

Tobey Maguire: Peter Parker is Peter Parker so it's important to not try and create new things just for the sake of it but I don't want to see the same scenes played out with Peter going through the same kind of things he's gone through. As an actor for me there was nothing stale about it, I got to approach it and got to do brand new really fun and interesting things for myself.

Question: Does this one go darker for you?

Tobey Maguire: We've gone into some different areas without losing touch of who Peter Parker is.

Question: Is this the completion of the Spider-Man story?

Kirsten Dunst: There's definitely a culmination, it ties up some storylines. If there are more storylines to tell we'll tell them. I think everyone's game.

Question: Have you made a conscious effort to go darker as in an anti-hero?

Tobey Maguire: That is part of our storyline but in terms of my perception I haven't thought about it like that.

Question: Talk about the decision to shoot in Cleveland, and why didn't you do more there? Did Spider-Man just have to save Cleveland at some point?

Sam Raimi: Well Cleveland was great. The soundstages are in L.A. All the stage work was done there and New York has always been the city of Spider-Man so we did some there too. Now, there is some car action in the story but we couldn't ask Manhattan ten straight blocks of city dedicated to our car chase. Cleveland could. So for ten days we were able to monopolize these streets, that's why we shot in Cleveland.

Question: Was there any technical challenge with Venom?

Sam Raimi: Venom is less of a technical challenge and more of an artistic challenge in trying to capture this very powerful somewhat spiderized, graceful but animal movement. It's like capturing a dance form on screen.

Question: I know you have a new composer for this one but will you still be using of Danny Elfman's themes?

Sam Raimi: I haven't yet spoken to Danny but I believe it will be Danny Elfman working in conjunction with Chris Young.

Question: Was this anything on this one which was really difficult physically for you Tobey?

Tobey Maguire: I enjoy doing this stuff and I do the stuff that I can do and that's safe. It's an interesting part of the job. When I watch the stuff that the stuntmen do, the crazy stuff, my mind gets blown and I go, I can't believe they do that. It's really amazing. Me saying this is a little ill-advised, most actors, I don't understand how they do this, the actors that come in and say, "I do all my own stunts." By the way, I just want to tell you guys now, any actor that says they do all their own stunts is not telling you the truth, unless they are jumping over a little gate or something.

Question: Can you talk about the challenge of adapting this story to the screen not one, not two, but three times and has the challenge increased each time?

Sam Raimi: What's been easier each time is getting to know the family that we work with and really trusting them to the point that they become complete collaborators. There are so many people that make this movie, there are a lot of smaller films where it is just one person and the actors and the writer and the producer, you have a tiny little court and we have a thousand people making this. So it's gotten a lot easier because we have gotten a system of knowing each other, knowing how we work together, trusting each other. That has made everything a lot easier.

Question: Sam you have had Dr. Curt Conners in three pictures and Avi Arad has said that The Lizard is one of his favorite villains are we ever going to see Dr. Curt Conners go down that path?

Sam Raimi: I'm not at liberty to say sir.

Question: Would you ever consider a crossover movie with another superhero?

Sam Raimi: It would have to be somebody that created some sort of serious conflict with Peter's whole point of view on this job of what superheroing is, it could be a lot of things but that's one idea though.

Question: Can you talk about the story in its relation to the comics?

Sam Raimi: In this story we are less specific but we did try and stay very true to the Venom comic books when they described his birth, the creation of Venom. We did try and stay true to the writers' and the artists' ideas on how that happened.

Question: What's the status of the Evil Dead remake?

Sam Raimi: I've been so busy with Spider-Man I haven't even had time to think about it. But what we want to do is find the right director who can really remake that story and spook the heck out of the audience, that's what we're looking to do.

Spider-Man 3 opens in theaters everywhere on May 4, 2007. If you haven't read my interview with Thomas Haden Church, Topher Grace and Bryce Dallas Howard you are going to want to do so right now right here.