Topher Grace to play a villain in Spiderman 3

[Mojambo]

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr/film/brief_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000929080

Topher Grace has joined the cast of "Spider-Man 3," which Sam Raimi is directing for Columbia Pictures. Producing are Laura Ziskin and Marvel Studio's Avi Arad. The studio said Grace will play one of two villains but declined to give further details.

Rumors continue to fly that Venom and Sandman will be the villains.

He have a source deep inside Sony who has seen the wardrobe and effects tests. These tests were later confirmed by Raimi. The source said there was a ton of sand being used, which fit in with all the Sandman rumblings I've heard out of the industry. We've heard from him/her/it very recently and he/she/it made mention of seeing something else.
There were apparently 3 different busts featuring VENOM in different poses. One, apparently, had an arm pointing its claw-like fingers out, one had an open "monster mouth" and one was just a regular bust. These were in the vein of McFarlane's vision of the character. There was also a lot of black cloth laying about the wardrobe area.

So Thomas Haden Church and Topher Grace are confirmed as playing baddies in the film. This is very interesting.

I think Church is going to play Sandman because Grace couldn't possibly pull that one off, but Topher as Venom? Wouldn't seem to work with the classic workup of that character

I think Raimi (who has never been a big fan of Venom) is going to dramatically re-work Venom's backstory to make Grace fit the part. With how much Grace and Maguire look alike they could be setting up Venom to be the polar opposite of Spiderman.

Or maybe Venom isn't in the picture at all. Who knows!

[Kire]

1. I heard Hobgoblin was the other villain.

and that role is still being filled by James Franco. The article from the AP I read said that Grace was playing a "complex character" but it did not specify if he was to be a villain or not.