BEFORE: I'm going to try very hard to catch up today - I stayed up late watching two movies in a row, now all I have to do is post two reviews very quickly, and I'll be back on track. JUST in time to work several long shifts at the Tribeca Film Festival, so I'll probably fall behind again, in just a couple of days. Well, I'm trying - if I do fall behind again, I'll have a lot of time in July to make it up - just let me get to my Father's Day film on time, that's all I ask.
Tom Hardy carries over from "Child 44". Time to play "Catching Up with Marvel Movies - Part 1".
FOLLOW-UP TO: "Venom" (Movie #3,177), "Spider-Man: No Way Home" (Movie #4,007)
THE PLOT: Eddie Brock attempts to reignite his career by interviewing serial killer Cletus Kasady, who becomes the host of the symbiote Carnage and escapes prison after a failed execution.
AFTER: SPOILER ALERT ahead, but not for "Venom: Let There Be Carnage", the alert is for "Spider-Man: No Way Home", so if you haven't seen that one yet, please skip a few paragraphs below, because it's now impossible to talk about one film without talking about the other - they're kind of intertwined.
AFTER: SPOILER ALERT ahead, but not for "Venom: Let There Be Carnage", the alert is for "Spider-Man: No Way Home", so if you haven't seen that one yet, please skip a few paragraphs below, because it's now impossible to talk about one film without talking about the other - they're kind of intertwined.
Now, clearly I'm getting to this film very late, and as a result I've watched the films from the Spider-Multi-Verse in the WRONG order. If you've been keeping track, Marvel's been fighting with Sony for YEARS over the rights to Spider-Man, so as a result the three films with Tobey Maguire and the two films with Andrew Garfield were kept separate from the main MCU films like "Avengers", "Iron Man", the three Captain Americas and one of the Hulk films (?) - obviously there are more, but let's move on. Tensions between the two companies eased this year with the formation of a movie multi-verse, in which all team-ups and crossovers are possible, as long as someone finds a way to use magic or science and a character says the word "multiverse" at some point. This led to a film with three Spider-Men and villains from three different universes getting together, all because Spider-Man's identity was revealed, and he tried to get Dr. Strange to cast a spell to change reality. It did not go well, except for the fact that all companies involved made more money than is humanly possible, enough to fund another multiverse of potential sequels.
Venom got caught up in this, in a way that makes zero sense - he only appeared in the mid-credits scene, he didn't meet Spider-Man (any of them) or fight Spider-Man (ditto), he just sat in a tropical bar for a few days, drinking cocktails. Now, what was the FREAKING point of that? Anyway, he never should have been there in the first place, because Dr. Strange's spell only applied to characters who knew that Spider-Man is also Peter Parker, people like Dr. Octopus and Green Goblin in Universe A and The Lizard and Electro from Universe B. There was A VENOM in Universe A who knew, but it wasn't this, the Tom Hardy Venom, it was the Topher Grace Venom. Right? So why did Tom Hardy Venom get teleported to the MCU? Was there a clerical error in the Department of Multiverse Transportation?
Now, finally, I'm getting to see the same scene from Venom's perspective, because at the end of "Let There Be Carnage", Eddie Brock takes his symbiote to a tropical beach, not only to relax but to get away from the people whose brains Venom wants to eat. From there, they are both transported to the main MCU because of Dr. Strange's spell. Upon arrival in the MCU, they see J. Jonah Jameson on TV, revealing Peter Parker's double life. Immediately, the Venom symbiote doesn't like Spider-Man, and expresses a desire to eat his brain - but, where is this coming from? This symbiote is not the one from "Spider-Man 3", so it's never even met Parker OR Spider-Man. The key, I suppose, is the implication that the Venoms from the different universes share some kind of hive-mind, so their memories and experiences are shared throughout the multi - but really, this feels like a huge narrative cop-out. Also a huge disappointment, to bring the characters into the same universe for basically no reason at all.
Why does Venom have to have his OWN universe? Why does he need to live in a universe without the Avengers or the X-Men? I mean, I guess there's no effort expended by a writer saying, "OK, so next to THAT universe, there's another one in which..." but come on, this Venom could have easily occupied his own corner of the Andrew Garfield Spider-Verse and it wouldn't have made a damn bit of difference. And you can't tell me at the SAME TIME that there's a Venom in every universe and also some universes (like the MCU) that don't already have one. Make up your damn mind, already, which is it? It's too late to fix this, we've already seen that it's easier to just place a new character in a new timeline than it is to explain why they've existed in the MCU but have been in hiding or off-planet for the last 10 years, like Captain Marvel was.
Anyway, it seems like MCU Spider-Man and Venomverse Venom just aren't meant to be a thing, they'll have to muddle through without each other - two ships that passed in the night between dimensions. But then, what's Spider-Man without his arch-enemy / evil twin / mirror double? What's Batman without the Joker, or Superman without Lex Luthor, Captain America without the Red Skull? Boring, that's what. When the Venom character first hit the comics, Eddie Brock was positioned as Peter Parker's opposite, another journalist who wasn't above cutting corners for the sake of a story, a tabloid journalist who got the facts about a serial killer wrong, and thus discredited, and he blamed Peter Parker for revealing the truth, which got him fired. This guy connected with the "alien costume" which Spider-Man brought back from the Secret Wars, and was bonding with him, stealing his energy and forcing him to go out on midnight villain patrol while technically asleep. The bonding was about to become permanent but he was able to free himself from the costume in time - but then when the costume teamed up with Brock, two creatures that hated the same person came together, and Venom shared the knowledge of Spider-Man's identity, thus creating the ultimate enemy for Spider-Man.
The 2018 Venom film took away all the most important parts of this origin story, leaving just the fact that the costume came from outer space, and the bonding with Eddie Brock. Yawn city, where's the motivating grudge against Peter Parker, where's the rancor over losing his newspaper job, what's driving the engine, besides just a desire to eat human brains? Sure, other stuff happened, but the fact that I can't remember any of it should tell you something. There was a science lab. - right, the Life Foundation, there was another symbiote named Riot, and there were a bunch of explosions. That's all that stuck with me, and that should tell you something. This Venom NEEDS a Spider-Man to fight, and right now, I don't care which one.
Instead, what they've done is put him up against Carnage, which is a sneaky trick to make Venom look like less of a villain (and more of an anti-hero), just put him up against another character who's much, much worse. I try not to read the "Carnage" solo comics that Marvel puts out, because they're generally way too gory, and buying them would sort of justify a level of violence that I think maybe goes too far. But I see the strategy here, Venom bites the heads off of criminals, but he does that to feed, to survive, while Carnage just kills because he enjoys it. But then who are we to say one set of killings is better than another? Wrong is wrong, in any universe.
What's really going on here is in the same vein, I suspect, as "Cruella", "Maleficent" and the three Star Wars prequels explaining Darth Vader's turn to the dark side. If they can just go back to describe each character's origin story, learn why they're so messed up in the first place, surely we can justify their evil on a sliding scale, right? I mean, Vader had a darn good reason for killing all the other Jedi, right? Sure, and Thanos meant well, too, but finding reasons for these characters' villainous actions comes a bit too close to justifying them, if you ask me. But just because Venom needs to ingest a certain chemical, that can't POSSIBLY excuse him biting off human heads - nor should the fact that Brock tries to limit him to killing only bad people. Bad people all deserve to die? No chance for due process, remorse or rehabilitation? Guess not, but that's a weird message to send out to the kids.
Eddie Brock is on the outs at the start of this sequel - no girlfriend, no job and just learning to live with his new roommate, the Venom symbiote. All I could think about was the set-up for "The Odd Couple" - can two down and out characters share an apartment, without driving each other crazy? Apparently not, especially when they happen to also share a BODY. After the Carnage character is introduced, the man and his alien decided to separate, Venom wants to see other host bodies, while Eddie just wants some peace and quiet, and a chance to do some home repairs. But deep down, we all know that these two crazy kids have just GOT to come back together, most likely to take down Carnage.
They also added a girlfriend for Carnage here, someone he knew at the orphanage, who has superpowers or mutant powers, despite the fact that there are no other superheroes or supervillains in the VenomVerse. (Again, screenwriters, make up your minds! You created this universe, why can't you be consistent about what's in it?). This character, Shriek, is taken from the comic books, specifically a cross-over called "Maximum Carnage", but in the comics she met Carnage as an adult, not as a teen. There's a weird interplay here because Shriek's super-power, the ability to scream really loud, also tends to damage the symbiotes, whose main weaknesses are fire and loud noises.
There's also a police detective character, and this was extremely confusing for me - why was Eddie Brock, reporter, taking orders from a detective? Did I miss something, was Eddie Brock a cop in the last film? In most universes, reporters don't work for the police, so things must be really different in the VenomVerse. Detective Mulligan is someone with a past connection to Shriek, he shot her when she was trying to escape from the cops, and collectively the two villains here are united in their hatred of three characters - Cletus Kasady hates Eddie Brock, Shriek hates Detective Mulligan, and Carnage hates Venom, his pseudo-"father". I don't know, is this enough of a storyline? It sure doesn't feel like it - one big battle, and this film is over, but good luck trying to get a refund from your local theater manager. The detective manages to survive the film, and seems to walk away with super-powers and knowledge of the symbiotes, but for the life of me, I can't figure out what villain he's going to turn into in "Venom 3."
Really, there's only ONE way to follow up this storyline, the next film should go all-out and adapt Marvel's "King in Black" crossover series. In this storyline, the God of the symbiotes, Knull, breaks free after thousands of years in captivity, and comes to Earth, turning it into a planet full of symbiotes. Epic scale, perhaps even too big for a movie, but it would be interesting to see, I think.
There's a point in this film where Venom, released from Brock, spends time exploring the San Francisco nightlife, and all that entails. This does raise a few questions, I suppose, about the relationship between Eddie Brock and Venom - are they an interspecies couple? Or are they even closer than that, because they share a body and care about each other, on some level? I don't know, but Happy Pride Month, Venom!
Also starring Woody Harrelson (last seen in "Shock and Awe"), Michelle Williams (last seen in "Wonderstruck"), Naomie Harris (last seen in "Tristram Shandy: A Cock & Bull Story"), Reid Scott (last seen in "I'll See You in My Dreams"), Stephen Graham (last heard in "Hellboy" (2019)), Peggy Lu (last seen in "Always Be My Maybe"), Sian Webber, Larry Olubamiwo, Little Simz, Sean Delaney, Olumide Olorunfemi, Jack Bandeira (last seen in "Gunpowder Milkshake"), Scroobius Pip, Stewart Alexander (last seen in "The Batman"), Christopher Godwin (last seen in "The Dig"), Reece Shearsmith (last seen in "Birthday Girl"), Rosie Marcel with archive footage of Tom Holland (last seen in "Spider-Man: No Way Home"), J.K. Simmons (last seen in "Being the Ricardos") and a cameo from Sonny Ashbourne Serkis (also carrying over from "Child 44")
RATING: 6 out of 10 holes in the ceiling
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