Review: Sony’s ‘Venom’ Is ‘The Room’ Of Unintentionally Funny Comic Book Films
There seems to be yet another phenomenon in Hollywood, where the studios aren’t quite sure what it is they want besides money. Venom is an example of such a movie. You see, Hollywood is taking intellectual property that is popular, but forgetting why it was popular in the first place. They’re making movies and TV shows without the main character:
Joker without Batman (New Joaquin Phoenix film).
Superman without Superman (Krypton).
Venom without Spider-Man (Venom).
Gotham with a kid/teenage Bruce Wayne (Gotham).
This can take a different turn where the protagonist of the film merely fights a doppelganger of themselves:
Iron Man fighting a bigger Iron Man (Iron Man)
The Incredible Hulk Fought another Hulk-like monster (The Incredible Hulk).
Doctor Strange fights another wizard (Doctor Strange).
Captain America fights another similar superhuman (Captain America: Winter Soldier).
It goes on. Venom is an entire movie filled with “Why was this even made?” Venom is one of the most popular Spider-Man villains/antiheroes. Without the mention of Spider-Man, Brock’s (Tom Hardy) jealousy over Peter Parker, and the entire location of NYC being replace with San Francisco, it really gave me the Catwoman vibe — another example of a character without Batman in a solo film that no one is sure why it exists.
Premise: Journalist Eddie Brock is trying to take down Carlton Drake, the notorious and brilliant founder of the Life Foundation. While investigating one of Drake’s experiments, Eddie’s body merges with the alien Venom — leaving him with superhuman strength and power. Twisted, dark and fueled by rage, Venom tries to control the new and dangerous abilities that Eddie finds so intoxicating.
Did Venom have some entertaining parts? Of course it did. Tom Hardy delivered a performance way too good for the material he was given. And once again, filmmakers decided to cover his face. Why must everyone want to cover Tom Hardy’s face? That’s like telling Whitney Houston she can’t sing in The Bodyguard.
Other than a few funny scenes and the cliche character of the bad guy thinking he’s doing the right thing when he’s really just a bad guy, the movie largely faults under the baffling reason of it having no reason to exist besides intellectual property.
Drake (Ahmed) wants to save the human race using some half-cooked idea about using the alien symbiote that crashed on Earth. In a strange and incoherent plan, he wants to use the symbiote to send humans into space. Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy), is a journalist who gets some information on Ahmed and investigates. Stuff happens, more stuff happens, what you think is going to happen actually happens, it ends, then a post-credits scene. The post-credit scene deserved its own review.
It goes on. Venom is an entire movie filled with “Why was this even made?” Venom is one of the most popular Spider-Man villains/antiheroes. Without the mention of Spider-Man, Brock’s (Tom Hardy) jealousy over Peter Parker, and the entire location of NYC being replace with San Francisco, it really gave me the Catwoman vibe — another example of a character without Batman in a solo film that no one is sure why it exists.
Related: Tom Hardy Is Venom In The First Trailer That All Comic Book Fans Have Been Waiting For
Venom is lost in a time where it doesn’t belong. This movie should’ve come out when previous franchises like Resident Evil were making their debut. It would totally fit for the time this movie was meant for and not for the already overstuffed comic book film genre we have to deal with now.
After only one viewing with a load of notes, I can see how this film could end up with a cult status. Maybe the cult status will be ironic like it is for The Room. Both movies were started with good intentions; and both movies are complete disasters, but you can’t help but appreciate how much a care went into it being such a disaster.
It tries too hard to be both a dark comic book film and a comedy. The only one that seems to recognize both of these is Tom Hardy. What’s unfortunate is that no one else recognized it before they started shooting the film. What could’ve been dark could’ve been darker, and what could’ve been funny could’ve been funnier. The problem this movie had was constantly undercutting one with the other. It became an exercise in waiting for a moment to get ruined over and over again.
I would still recommend seeing this film eventually, just maybe not in theaters. Sony can’t make a comic book film to save its life. The flashbacks of deciding on the name for the Fantastic Four in the most recent film still gives me anxiety. Just let Marvel take the reins on Venom next because this isn’t working out.
Venom is directed by Ruben Fleischer from a screenplay by Scott Rosenberg, Jeff Pinkner, and Kelly Marcel, and stars Tom Hardy as Eddie Brock/Venom, alongside Michelle Williams, Riz Ahmed, Scott Haze, and Reid Scott. Venom is out in theaters now.
Rating: 4/10 Stars.