I had stopped reading comics by the time Venom made his debut. So my first exposure to the character of Venom came in the third Spider-Man film, released in 2008 and directed by Sam Riami. After a powerhouse second outing with Spider-Man 2, the third and final Riami-directed Spider-Man movie was a huge let down, thanks to the multitude of villains that the Wall-Crawler had to contend with--Venom, being one of a trio of baddies gunning for Spidey, really should have been the sole villain of that film (reportedly studio interference was responsible for the multi-villain story line).
Now, ten years after Spider-Man 3, Venom returns, but in his own movie without Spider-Man. Tom Hardy is the star, appearing as Eddie Brock, a reporter in San Francisco who’s trying to seek the truth about an Elon Musk-type of tech tycoon named Charlton Drake (Riz Ahmed), who’s rumored to be doing illegal experiments. The rumors turn out to be true. One of Drake’s spaceships crash lands on earth, bringing back several samples of oily-looking parasitic life forms that take over a host. After watching animals being seized by these gooey critters, Drake gets the bright idea to start using humans.
Brock gets infected while he’s in Drake’s lab after hours. The chatty parasite (who doesn’t like being called that) introduces itself as Venom and thus begins the real fun. Venom keeps Brock alive in unpleasant situations by taking over his body and turning him into a badass fighter--and Brock has these exasperated looks while his body goes into Bruce Lee mode. It’s a clever and humorous way of having the main character deal with action scenes without having him go through any boring training montages.
What’s also clever is how funny Venom is overall. The interaction between Brock and Venom almost feels like one of these cop buddy movies. The humor is much needed; it smooths over the silliness of the overall concept, which is a guy possessed by an oil slick from outer space. There was some worry early on whether Venom would work on his own, without Spider-Man--but seeing how the movie made just short of a billion dollars, it looks like that worry was for nothing.
The problem is that Venom takes its time building up to the fun moments, and even when we’re in full Venom mode, the movie lacks any real substance. The high body count is basically shrugged off, and Eddie Brock doesn’t really have much of a character arc--it’s actually when he becomes Venom that he deals with the problems in his life. And the main villain almost feels like an afterthought, yet another spoiled brat billionaire cliche from silicon valley. The always good Michelle Williams, who has a radiant screen presence, still feels largely wasted here as the stock ’superhero girlfriend’.
We’re introduced to a potential villain in a post credits scene, who even speaks the name of the character he’ll be playing--and the intensity that he projects in just a few lines makes one wonder why wasn’t he the main villain of this movie. Still, while Venom made me laugh, it still wasn't good enough to make me want to run out and buy this movie. Perhaps the promised sequel (which is all but guaranteed, thanks to the first film’s success), with its promise of a baddie who'll give Venom a real run for his money, will be better. --SF
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