Venom

When Sony announced it was, indeed, doing a Venom film that was unconnected with the new Spider-Man stuff they were doing in conjunction with Marvel, I was as confused and concerned as anyone.

After all, their last two Spider-Man films were… well… not the greatest. (I was really, really disappointed in the second one, the trailer made it look so much better.) And they had trashed the whole plan for a Sinister Six movie and whatnot after the new deal with Marvel to give us our Webhead in Civil War and his own Homecoming movie… and those were awesome.

So I didn’t go to see Venom in the theater when it came out.

A lot of other people did. Like, a lot of other people. It made over $80 million in its opening weekend and over $213 million during it’s full theatrical run.

Just about all the talk that came out of those people was good.

Now that I’ve seen it, I can say it was well-deserved. But I do still have some issues, mostly due to being a long-time Spider-Man fan.

The Plot

Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy, who’s been in a lot of stuff lately) is a hot shot reporter, even though he had to cross the country from NY to San Francisco to shake off some bad decisions he made on the East Coast. He specializes in taking on social issues and taking down people who are too big for their britches and using their power to hurt the common man.

Carlton Drake (Riz Ahmed) is a famous rich tech guy. He’s made a ton of money in pharmaceuticals and gene therapy. Lately, he’s been spending some of that money launching space ships to… somewhere. We find out right at the beginning of the film that he’s brought some things back from that somewhere and that one of them has gotten loose after the ship crashed on reentry.

Needless to say, Brock gets sent on assignment to do a puff piece to help Drake’s company spin some good PR about how they’ve improved their rocket program since the crash. Brock being Brock, and having gotten his hands on some confidential info, turns the interview into a hostile one by levying accusation of human experimentation at Drake.

That doesn’t go well.

Drake gets angry. Brock gets fired. Brock’s fiance, Anne (Michelle Williams), dumps him. And then we skip ahead six months to Brock being a down-and-out loser living in a run down apartment and mostly drinking and looking for whatever work he can get.

And that’s when he gets drawn back into what Drake’s been working on. One breaking and entering later and Brock is now host to the Venom symbiote.

From that point forward, hilarity and destruction ensue.

“So many snacks. So little time.”

I remember when Venom first showed up in the comics. The odd love/hate triangle among Brock, Peter Parker, and the symbiote that evolved in those pages was kind of amazing. Weird, at times touching, but generally just weird with serious dips into utterly terrifying.

Imagine the angriest ex you can, one that you dumped but wasn’t over you yet… but give them super powers that match any you have… then crank them up a notch… and put that ex with someone who blames you for ruining their lives.

It was that wild mix that made Venom interesting to me. I was worried that, without that, the character wouldn’t feel right.

I’m still worried that the choice to have this separate from all the Spider-Man stuff will cut off the ability to do some great stories. But I’m not worried any more that it will ruin the Venom character.

Hardy (playing both Brock and the voice of Venom… so, really, he’s playing against himself all the time here) does a fantastic job of making Brock a more sympathetic character than he was in the comics while simultaneously making Venom a lot more fun than he often was in the comics. The combination is both comedy gold and dramatic fire.

Playing Eddie a bit reluctant and downright apprehensive about being host to Venom is fantastic. It almost makes the leap from Venom just wanting to eat everyone to wanting to save humanity almost believable. (But only almost… it was an awkward change with just some hand-waving to “explain” it.)

The action is top-notch. The chase through San Fran is one of the better ones I’ve seen (not quite on the level of Bullitt, or Ant Man and The Wasp, but few are) and really shows of Venom’s abilities well.

The big final confrontation between Venom and Riot, being near 100% computer generated (because, really, nothing moves like these creatures) was super impressive with some very clever combat tactics. Even better, even with the symbiotes twisting and turning all over the place, you could still tell what was going on, putting it far ahead of, say, any Transformers movie I’ve been able to sit through.

Some of the most fun in the movie, though, comes from Venom’s need to eat. Not tater tots or rotting chicken from the trash. No, Venom needs things that are fresh. Preferably brains. Often human brains. Maybe a pancreas. Or lungs.

The shot that made it into the trailer of Venom holding a guy up by his neck, curling his impossibly long tongue across his face and saying “So many snacks. So little time.” is part of a great scene where we really get to see why you really don’t want to mess with Venom.

The Verdict

This movie was infinitely better than I was afraid it was going to be and at least as good as I hoped it would be. Some of it was just brilliant.

They managed to adjust the backstory and characters in a way that they’re still recognizable as the themselves while opening up the door to make them viable to a fresh audience as well as old fans. Even more impressive, they have, indeed, managed to make Venom, in his first outing, a character that can stand on his own and carry a movie or three.

I still have some issues, but that’s only because I would love to see interaction between Venom and Spider-Man like we had in the comics. Them fighting, them reluctantly working together. But that’s just not going to happen with this iteration.

If you’re not hung up on that, and you love some dark humor and solid action, definitely check Venom out. It’s not perfect, but it’s fun and action-packed in all the right ways.