In a November 2013 email sent to then-Sony co-chairperson Amy Pascal, who was in that position during the Sony Pictures hack in 2014, Feige gave insight on Amazing Spider-Man 2 that included praise and constructive criticism in regards to Electro:
"Really love Electro - feels like you may not need the scene in his apartment, which makes him seems completely crazy and hard to relate too [sic]," Feige wrote in the
leaked email, referring to Electro's mild-mannered alter-ego Max Dillon.
In Amazing Spider-Man 2, Dillon is depicted as an overlooked Oscorp employee and a self-proclaimed "nobody." In the scene taking place in his lonely apartment, covered wall-to-wall in Spidey-obsessed paraphernalia, the ravings of a delusional Max culminates in an imagined conversation with his superhero "best friend”.
Feige also commented on Max's transformation into Electro, which occurs when the hapless Max — an electrical engineer — tumbles into a tank of electric eels while attempting to fix a loose cable.
"Like the idea that eel goes in his mouth and instead of burrowing, you see it glow within him," Feige wrote. On the scene where an electrocuted Max wakes up in the morgue, Feige added, "Kind of like the morgue, but hate the dancing mortician - cliché."
Besides recommending the idea of visually setting up the power plant from which Electro draws his power in the climax of the film, Feige also offered commentary on the film's supporting villain: Russian mobster Aleksei Sytsevich (Paul Giamatti), a.k.a. the rampaging Rhino.
