Jasonic's Favorites: Venom
Hello, and good evening, Internet!
Venom was always among my favorite Spider-Man villains so the fact that they became the most prominent Sony Spider-Man Universe character with a trilogy starting with this film is awesome no matter what people say about the movies themselves.
Released in 2018, Venom was the first in a short, but decently-lived lineup of Sony films based solely around Spider-Man's rogues gallery. Production attachment had shifted for so many years even prior to the character appearing as the final villain in Spider-Man 3 in 2007; more serious commitments were made when The Amazing Spider-Man franchise took off, but production was stalled when that series fell flat. With Sony striking the deal with Marvel to let Spidey joining the MCU in late 2015/early 2016, Sony kickstarted their own separate universe beginning with the current version of Venom we got. Despite negative reviews and mixed reception on other aspects, it was a box office success and audiences were enthralled by aspects such as the relationship between Eddie and Venom. As a Spider-Man fan who saw a significant time when Venom was a central figure in the comics, shows, and games, the hype and money this film garnered was understandable; as one of the few Spidey villain staples that came later than the 60s (late 80s to be exact), Venom has been among the many antiheroic figures that much of comic book media leaned toward throughout the 1990s. With them being the first major Spider-Man villain to get their own series in the form of Venom: The Lethal Protector, it was clear that the character had such a following to a point where many wanted to see them go on escapades separate from Spider-Man. Antiheroes, after all, have a much different moral code from regular heroes, which makes their actions and dilemmas all the more interesting compared to the morally good superheroes we all know. If that was the case with why people loved Venom, then why does this film get so much hate? For many critics, it boils down to the script and acting among other things, but I don't have as much of a problem with it. In fact, this was a great rewatch when I finally got to it the other day. So what do I think of it? To find out, let's visit the Life Foundation, acquire a Symbiote, and beast our way into the chaotic fun fest that is Sony's Venom!
*SPOILERS* (unless you don't care)
As mentioned, the story begins the first installment of a universe of Spider-Man villains; in it, a Life Foundation probe has been examining a nearby comet for signs of alien life before it crash lands in Malaysia. Among the specimens, one infects several people as it travels to the U.S. Meanwhile in San Francisco, investigative journalist, Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy), is in a good relationship with his fiancée, Anne Weying (Michelle Williams), an attorney who's received classified information on the Life Foundation killing people in human trials. Upon confronting the CEO, Carlton Drake (Riz Ahmed), about the trials, Eddie and Anne subsequently lose their jobs, Anne ending their engagement and Eddie moving out. Six months later, Eddie lives as a depressed loner, disgraced for his stunt while struggling to find a job and peace; disturbed by Drake's continued human trials, one of his employees, Dr. Dora Skirth (Jenny Slate), approaches Eddie to ask for assistance in exposing him, breaking him into the facility to find evidence. To Eddie's horror, a homeless woman he knows is down there and attacks him, the Symbiote possessing her finding its way to Eddie while she dies. Eddie goes home to some strange symptoms such as an insatiable need for food, even going as far as eating out of the garbage before getting sick and realizing something must be wrong with him. To his luck, Anne's new boyfriend, Dr. Dan Lewis (Reid Scott), is able to examine Eddie for what's going on with him, Eddie also finding that whatever's possessing him is alive and can talk to him. In the event that Drake sends his enforcers to track Eddie and take back the Symbiote, Eddie finds what the alien can do in an epic motorcycle chase. Introducing itself as Venom (voiced by Brad Veneble), the two do their best to work together to evade Drake's forces and the authorities. What Venom reveals about Drake's intentions and the presence of the other Symbiote in the world will result in Eddie needing to work together with Venom to prevent their world from ever coming close to being overrun by a Symbiote invasion.
One reason people may understandably not like this movie plotwise is the setup; it does all the things with the Venom origin like the meteorite and the shuttle crashing to Earth, but for many people are disappointed this movie completely omitted Spider-Man from the picture. That's not a huge deal in my opinion, but on the other hand, the comic book movie setup of a shady corporation putting on a nice face for the public while secretly using humans as sacrificial guinea pigs is nothing new. Most say that is a huge cliche and I'm sort of there with them, especially coming a few years off the heels of The Amazing Spider-Man franchise, which portrayed Oscorp the same way. Rewatching this film once again at my present age and current understanding of comic book cliches allowed me to feel the dullness of the first thirty minutes, which could have put the nail in the coffin for me if I didn't already enjoy Venom or know what was gonna happen. For me, however, the fun of this movie really kicks in when Venom enters Eddie and things start to get really entertainingly bizarre and thrilling; the relationship between Eddie and Venom is what makes this franchise and, despite any negativity and criticism, most everyone would agree that this was the best part. The way that Eddie starts acting out to the point of eating everything in his apartment even out of the garbage, hearing Venom's growly voice in his head exclaiming "Food!", and making a scene at the restaraunt by eating dead lobster and climbing in the lobster tank makes for some funny early quirks of Eddie acquiring the Symbiote. Once Venom starts talking and assisting him in the action scenes is when the thrills really kicks in; you have Venom's tendrils flaring out and throwing Eddie around to help him kick their persuer's asses, trashing Eddie's apartment in the process. The two of them as they talk can be like a funny buddy comedy duo and less like a split personality and more of a hybrid being with the two working in tandem, which is what Venom should be. One of my favorite and the funniest interaction cut between the two is when Venom tells Eddie to jump out of the building before it cuts to Eddie hitting the elevator button to which Venom comments, "Pussy!" With this movie having stuff like that, some cool Symbiote action, and the thrills of a lot of the action scenes, it's a shame that this got worse flak than Spider-Man 3 -- Venom's previous live action appearance -- and while the criticism for its plot choices and cliches are understandable, I can't bring myself to hate it and what I have seen of the franchise and its main pair so far.
One complaint I often see is that the acting is weak, which is true to an extent, but it's not all bad. Tom Hardy, for one, is an interesting pick for Venom; given the repertoire he had for previously playing Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, it's almost a funny coincidence that he has now played both Batman's and Spider-Man's most significant antagonists that came later. His Eddie, however, is far from an antagonist; he was told in production to give him an "aw-shucks American accent", which adds to his arrogant attitude Eddie Brock is known for. This is far from Hardy's most stellar role, but I think he did a good job of disappearing into somebody a lot more quirky silly than what I had previously seen of him. The uncredited voice of Venom, Brad Venable (RIP), does a good job of providing the additional vocal work to make the voice come alive; he mostly provided growls and vocal effects in combination with Tom Hardy and they make him sound like the traditional Venom voice most fans of the character have come to know in other media. Michelle Williams is a welcome addition as Anne Weying and, apart from the main duo, she may be the better actor of most everybody else. She's not the most overdramatic when it comes to showing emotion, but there are times where she's required to raise her voice at Eddie, creating for more dynamic emotion where need be; unfortunately, she's a little restrained and the performance doesn't stick with me as much despite my interest in the character and her small appearance here as She-Venom. Nevertheless, her character is the capable love interest that became standard in superhero movies with Pepper Potts in Iron Man and Gwen Stacy in The Amazing Spider-Man. Despite what Riz Ahmed is capable of, however, he fails to be a gripping antagonist as Carlton Drake who later becomes Riot; on paper, he is that stereotypical greedy CEO who believes he is doing God's work, goading people to volunteer with Biblical philosophy and covering up the messes that he, himself, causes. Regardless, it's hard to get a read on his emotion a lot of the time; I get the sense that he's trying to be inspiring, intimidating, or creepy based on dialogue alone, but the delivery hardly convinces me that he's any of those things. Unfortunate as it may be, we at least have some recognizable names like Jenny Slate as Dora Skirth and while her performance and character isn't much to write home about, she pulled off the scientist assistant look pretty well. I haven't mentioned him much in my other Marvel reviews, but I wanted to mention here in particular that this film was the last Marvel film cameo Stan Lee would have seen while he was still living. Of course, he had filmed other cameos through to Avengers: Endgame the following year, but this one is worth noting because little did we know that he would pass away only one month after this movie came out. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and films up to Endgame saved this from being his last ever cameo and, were it not for him, we would have never had the amount of Marvel franchise powerhouses and successful movies we have today. To that I say: thank you Stan Lee for all these characters!
One instance I feel this movie succeeds is in the action and animation department with the Symbiotes and their special effects; the apartment fight preceding the motorcycle chase is the first time we really see Venom at the helm of controlling Eddie like he's a marionette and, boy, do those Symbiote tendrils manhandle everyone well! The way they stretch to smack all the enforcers around to throwing and propeling Eddie out of the way before he finally attempts to do a Spider-Man swing before crashing into someone else's apartment. Venom clearly isn't graceful as Spidey, but at least they didn't make him web swing everywhere for the sake of something different was refreshing and allowed to show Venom with different capabilities. The highlight motorcycle chase is the best example of a middle action scene being the highlight of the film with the way it showcases Venom using his tendrils to get Eddie out of trouble. From dragging Eddie's motorcycle across the ground into an Akira slide and latching onto the lamppost to allow him to drift around the corner to breaking down the pursuer's vehicles by breaking their windows and throwing them aside to finally the amount of resourcefulness Venom showcases by tearing off a car door to shield Eddie from an explosion. It is the most exciting action setpiece in the whole movie and I'm all for how unique it is with all the Venom elements and the setting of San Francisco. I'm with CinemaWins in how well Sony did the Symbiote animations in Spider-Man 3, but somehow they upped the ante for how fleshy and organically they are able to morph as they slither across the ground. The yellow Symbiote especially -- possibly a reference to Scream -- is probably the most otherworldly-looking of the Symbiotes shown and even the way they take over someone's body as they wrap and dissolve inside people's skin can throw the movie into a horror movie tone from time-to-time. This movie is, of course, far from a horror movie and I can commend it for doing a lot of things differently than what one would expect from a monster movie, much less a Venom movie in general. With that, I'd say even the final battle has its merits with the way Venom and Riot go toe-to-toe bonded to Eddie and Carlton Drake respectively. The way the Symbiotes morph their bodies into different weapons as well as in and out of each other as they get up close and personal is one of the coolest slowmo CGI pan arounds in an non-MCU Marvel movie up to that point. Eddie and Carlton going toe-to-toe in a fist fight after both seemingly lose their Symbiotes is an efficient way to break up the CGI funfest and even after that it still finds a way to end with a firey explosion when Venom comes back, revives Eddie, and tears apart the rocket with Riot and Drake inside. If there's anything that makes me excited for any less than stellar movies of this variety, it's the action and Venom shockingly delivers in that department.
So while Venom may have understandably had some criticism upon release, I'm glad to have found more I enjoyed about this movie again over the more less than stellar aspects I talked about and agreed with somewhat. It followed a lot of comic book movie cliches that most have come to loathe, but the relationship between the symbiotic protagonists, a good amount of the acting, the action, and CGI animation save it from being a bore/slog fest. Venom is, after all, among my favorite Marvel villains/characters so it's even a miracle that a film centered on them without Spider-Man managed to work well on its own when most may have assumed such an approach could have been a failure. With or without Spider-Man, Venom has proven in the comics that they can hold a series and with this being the beginning of the trilogy that upheld the Sony Spider-Man Universe for a while, I can call this series of films a mild success regardless of what people think of the other outings -- aside from maybe Morbius, but, you know, that movie is only known for its meme that caught on. That said, is Venom really a good film? I'd say so. In fact, I would give it a reasonable B- and recommend it to Marvel fans, fans of the character, fans of Tom Hardy, and those looking for decent entertainment.
Thank you all for reading and I will see you in the next review!
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