The Hollywood Reporter is announcing that Spider-Man director Sam Raimi has cast Thomas Hayden Church to grapple mercilessly with Tobey Maguire as the villain in Spider-Man 3. Just for a change, I thought I’d get right to the story and dispense with all my usual pre-amble rambling.

The odd thing here is that while Raimi is letting out who he’s cast to play the film’s villain, he has yet to reveal the identity of the villain himself. The biggest rumor rolling around right now is that it’ll be Sandman, a pretty lame bad guy, generally only beloved by the biggest, most pathetic comic book nerd fanboys. The rest of us are likely rooting for someone cool like Venom. Whoever it ends up being, the character will be played by Thomas Hayden Church.

Church really is an interesting choice, and reminds me in some way of the unique casting of Alfred Molina to play Doc Ock. This isn’t the type of role we’ve seen Church in before, but he’s a proven, non-character actor who could really bring some fresh air to the film franchise. He’d work well as Sandman, but for some reason I see him most as Hobgoblin. Hobgoblin is a character that’s Green Goblin like, but isn’t Green Goblin. The next Green Goblin is Harry Osborne, as alluded to by the maniacal cackling at the end of Spider-Man 2. I suppose they could always slather him in old folks makeup and turn him into the Vulture as well. Why not.