I enjoyed the 2018 Venom movie. It did require some mental gymnastics in accepting a Venom movie without Spider-Man in it. Why is that so difficult? Well, I recommend checking out the series of Venom episodes from the 90s Spider-Man animated series – they explain Venom better than I could.
But here’s a summary - Essentially Spider-Man picks up an alien symbiote that happily bonds with him – changing his costume black and enhancing his more dark & dangerous impulses. Upset when he realizes what the symbiote could empower him to do, Peter Parker separates himself from it using sonic vibrations (really loud noise). The symbiote falls to Eddie Brock – a reporter who has recently developed a world class hatred for Peter Parker for various reasons. So together, Eddie hates Peter, the symbiote hates Spider-Man, and they become Venom, united in their hatred of your friendly, neighborhood hero. Since he’s the focus of their hatred, they pretty easily shift into anti-hero territory, willing to help out others as long as they can continue to hate Spider-Man. So, if you can set aside all that backstory and cut out the Spider-Man from it (it’s really hard to do that), you can enjoy the movie. I particularly loved the bits of Venom just Venom-ing around San Francisco and being a ‘lethal protector’. Plus, Tom Hardy embraced the over-the-topness of the Jeckel and Hyde bit of the story, creating a very watchable Eddie Brock.
Once the symbiote reproduces/splits,
and a bit lands on insane serial killer Cletus Kassady, he bonds with the symbiote, causing pure chaos. A bit I always liked was that Kassady bonded
so completely, Carnage always uses “I” to refer to himself and Venom uses “we”,
since Eddie and the symbiote remain individuals.
In this movie, we pick up with Venom doing what they can to protect the city as Eddie struggles to keep the symbiote fed – but they are getting on each other’s nerves. After all, they do share the small living space of Eddie’s body. Eddie gets to write a story on killer Cletus Kassady, and the symbiote helps him be observant enough to figure out where some additional bodies are buried. This pissed off Cletus, who requests one more meeting with Eddie prior to being executed. In said meeting, he bites Eddie, picking up a bit of symbiote, which gets angry about the attempted execution and breaks them out of prison. Carnage then goes to pick up his lady friend from the institution in which she has been staying and they set about on a very Natural Born Killers type rampage of chaos and revenge – forcing Eddie and the symbiote to patch up their differences so that Venom can try to save the day.
The story is simple and straightforward and honestly, I liked it even more than the first – because here, we skip the origin part and get right to the adventure. Since the origin is the iffy-est bit of the first, this was great. Adding Andy Serkis as director is a good thing because he understands how to help actors with the physicality of tangling with something that is not there. He kept the action swift, light, and maintains a sense of fun through the whole piece. The fight scenes are really entertaining even if they get a little CGI-heavy, and watching Hardy again embrace big and crazy as Brock argues with the symbiote is fantastic. Hardy gets a writing credit on this one and has already said he’s looking forward to what he can do in the next one and now – so am I.
Woody Harrleson goes to gleefully crazy, which he is very good at, and let loose as Cletus. I didn’t need all the justification in his backstory for his lunacy, but hey, I suppose it provides a why. It doesn’t make him any less of a threat. The Carnage effects are fine, but I do wish he was a little more red. And, not having Peter Parker around to deliver some science-y exposition about the differences between the two symbiotes is not something most will miss (I did, a little).
I appreciate Michelle Williams as Anne and how she is both patient and irritated with Eddie. I also like that she is willing to help when necessary and admits that occasionally bonding with the symbiote is fun. Reid Scott as her fiancée Dr. Dan is still hilarious and unprepared for the situation – although he certainly steps up here when needed.
Naomie Harris plays Frances Barrison – Shriek – who in this version grew up with Cletus and is in love with him. She’s a mutant with big scream powers – interesting since the one thing the symbiotes hate is big noises.
Peggy Lu’s Mrs. Chen provides a wonderful stable base for
Venom to hangout. Stephen Graham plays
Detective Mulligan who may or may not at some point become Toxin – here, he’s
the guy who shot Shriek years ago and is still dealing with that trauma.
Overall, I really enjoyed this one and the run time is fantastic! At just over an hour and a half, it’s a reminder that not every movie needs to be two and a half hours long! Trim it up and deliver in the time you have. The post-credits sequence certainly has me intrigued for what is next – perhaps they will find a way to solve all the issues of the first movie? Because I really enjoy Hardy’s Venom and want him to be around for a long time.
8 out of 10
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