Venom (October 5, 2018)

[dpippel]

Title: Venom (2018)

Tagline: Embrace Your Inner Anti-Hero

Genre: Horror, Science Fiction, Action

Director: Ruben Fleischer

Cast: Tom Hardy, Michelle Williams, Riz Ahmed, Scott Haze, Reid Scott, Jenny Slate, Melora Walters, Woody Harrelson, Peggy Lu, Malcolm C. Murray, Sope Aluko, Wayne Pére, Michelle Lee, Kurt Yue, Chris O'Hara, Emilio Rivera, Amelia Young, Ariadne Joseph, Deen Brooksher, David Jones, Roger Yuan, Woon Young Park, Patrick Chundah Chu, Vickie Eng, Mac Brandt, Nick Thune, Michael Dennis Hill, Sam Medina, Scott Deckert, Lauren Richards, Jared Bankens, Lucas Fleischer, Michael Burgess, Diesel Madkins, Rxchie, Otis Winston, Zeva DuVall, Selena Anduze, Brittany L. Smith, Jordan Foster, Jane McNeill, Victor McCay, Elizabeth Becka, Ron Prather, Marcia White, Javier Vazquez Jr., Ellen Gerstein, Martin Bats Bradford, Steven Teuchert, Al-Jaleel Knox, Brandon Morales, Matthew Cornwell, David Fleischer, DJames Jones, Angela Davis, Stan Lee, Wade Williams, Ron Cephas Jones

Release: 2018-10-04

Plot: When Eddie Brock acquires the powers of a symbiote, he will have to release his alter-ego "Venom" to save his life.

Sony is doing a Venom movie, and it's already got an official release date:

http://variety.com/2017/film/box-office/venom-girl-in-the-spiders-web-1202010562/

 

[Jonathan Perregaux]

I wasn't sure if anything (short of a superhero movie about a growing blade of grass trying not to get mowed) could supplant my utter apathy towards Aquaman... but then this happened.

 

[Oliver Ravencrest]

I'm interested in seeing this, I like Venom as a character but I prefer him as a Villain in a Spider-man story. I'm not sure if he would work as the main character in a solo movie. We'll see how it goes,.

 

[DavidJ]

Spoiler: Fan Theory

Did y'all see the fan theory that the movie Life is actually setting up Venom? That would be brilliant and would be better than a space movie that looks and feels like one we've seen many times before.

 

[Sean Bryan]

I'm not too wild about this.

Unlike the new Spider-Man, this isn't being done by Marvel Studios. So is it part of the MCU without Marvel's involvement? That seems unlikely. Is it its own separate thing not related to Spidey? That would be odd since that is a major part of what this character is. And if it is separate, most movie goers would still remain clueless about the distinction.

Plus, if separate, that would seem to limit Marvel's story options to eventually explore this story (properly) in future films. No

Spoiler

Spidey finding the black suit while off-world during Infinity War, etc...

 

[dpippel]

Big news! Tom Hardy has signed on to star as Eddie Brock in Venom, with Ruben Fleischer directing:

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/he...tom-hardy-star-ruben-fleischer-direct-1004115

 

[Bryan^H]

and Spiderman should be back in the hands of Sony by the time the sequel is made so win/win.

 

[Sean Bryan]

Tom Hardy is an interesting choice, but I still find this whole thing to be completely bizzare.

That Sony is going ahead and developing a "Sony Marvel" universe (Venom, Silver Sable, etc...) using Spider-Man characters but not using Spider-Man (since Sony's new Spider-Man series is part of the MCU and these are not part of the MCU) is just really weird and confusing.

 

[TravisR]

Tom Hardy sure has the physicality for Eddie Brock (aka Venom).

 

[Sean Bryan]

and Spiderman should be back in the hands of Sony by the time the sequel is made so win/win.

Well, Spider-Man never left Sony's hands. He's still there. The new Spider-Man movies are Sony's movies. Sony is just wisely letting Marvel Studios produce the movies for them and they both benefit from the collaboration. Sony gets a Spidey that is part of the popular and successful MCU. Marvel gets to use this same new version of the charter in their MCU movies. That's the win-win, and a smart move by Sony (and Marvel).

But Sony going ahead and pushing to develop other movies using Spider-Man characters that aren't part of the MCU and don't use Spider-Man seems to be a really concerning prospect. We already saw what happened when they tried too hard to develop their "Spidey Universe" in The Amazing Spider-Man 2. It killed that iteration of the franchise. Now they're trying to do something similar again but without Spider-Man? Yikes!

There is still a great deal not known about the specifics of what they are doing. So maybe they are actually handeling it smartly and are still respecting and taking into account what they are doing with Spider-Man in the MCU with these movies, even if they aren't officially part of the MCU. But at this point, I don't have a great feeling about this.

 

[Sam Favate]

Hmmm... a character I never liked, played by an actor I never much cared for.

Yeah, it's not winning me over.

 

[dpippel]

Woody Harrelson has joined the cast:

http://variety.com/2017/film/news/venom-woody-harrelson-tom-hardy-1202563687/

 

[Jake Lipson]

I'm not sure why Sony thinks a Spider-Man-less Venom movie, not in the MCU and not under Marvel's supervisison, is a good idea, when they got their mojo back on Spider-Man specifically by integrating him into the MCU.

They do have an impressive cast lined up. I'll give them that much. But I still don't really have any interest in seeing this based on what I've heard so far.

 

[dpippel]

It's not doing much for me either, but I'm willing to keep an open mind until we see the first trailer.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Zero interest whatsoever in any Sony-produced takes on Marvel characters that don't involve Marvel producing. The Maguire and Garfield Spider-Man movies are enough evidence to me that Sony doesn't know how to handle these properties on their own. They're out of chances with me.

 

[Sean Bryan]

I'm not sure why Sony thinks a Spider-Man-less Venom movie, not in the MCU and not under Marvel's supervisison, is a good idea, when they got their mojo back on Spider-Man specifically by integrating him into the MCU.

They do have an impressive cast lined up. I'll give them that much. But I still don't really have any interest in seeing this based on what I've heard so far.

It’s quite odd what they are doing. And it doesn’t stop with Venom. They are also doing something with Black Cat and Silver Sable (and I’ve heard other rumors as well).

They clearly haven’t let go of the misguided idea that they could build up a “cinematic universe” revolving around one character’s supporting characters and rogues. That they are pushing forward with this stuff, without Spider-Man, is just bizarre.

 

[dpippel]

That in and of itself makes it at least interesting to me.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Do they retain any sort of right to include Spider-Man in those titles?

Amy Pascal from Sony said at one point that after the Homecoming sequel, they would likely not partner with Marvel any further. I only read that once and never again so I wonder if the author of the article misunderstood. But if that was a real quote, maybe they're getting all these villains ready for Spidey to fight after Homecomimg 2 is done with.

Though I think it would be a tremendous mistake for Sony to stop cooperating with Marvel. I wouldn't pay to see another Spider-Man that's unconnected to the MCU at this point.

 

[Jake Lipson]

The thing is that because Tom Holland's Spider-Man has been firmly established as part of the MCU, if Holland is in it, that automatically means that the film exists within the MCU.

I assume Marvel must have a provision in their deal to preclude Holland's Spider-Man from appearing in a film that they did not supervise, because that automatically sullies their brand, and they've been extremely careful about brand consistency and quality control over there.

Whether Sony would have the right to include another Spider-Man who is not Tom Holland in one of these villain offshoots is an open question. I would not be interested in that, either. While I am impressed by the cast of this film, I am not really interested in seeing this, either, precisely because Sony is doing it on their own.

That also brings up the question of whether or not the average moviegoer will understand that the Venom film is not part of the MCU. We do because we follow this sort of thing on the internet and discuss it here, but we are film enthusiasts, not the typical casual film consumer. If people know that Spider-Man is now in the MCU, and Venom is one of his villains, it wouldn't be a particularly hard assumption to think that the Venom film is also in the MCU. I'm sure Sony would love for most people to make that mistake because it would rub off well for them if that were to be the case. In contrast, Marvel will have to figure out a way to distance the MCU brand from these kinds of projects so that your average moviegoer doesn't confuse the two, especially if Venom ends up being bad. Their more elaborate theme music and logo on their recent films is probably a good start, but since the Marvel logo will be on Venom regardless, I'm not sure it's quite enough.

I also do not believe that Homecoming 2 (or whatever it actually ends up being called) will be the last we see of Holland in the role, either. There is no reason to expect that the first sequel will be anything other than extremely successful, both because Homecoming was well-received and because Holland will receive additional exposure in two Avengers films before we get to that one. So, Sony will see a huge profit off of the Homecoming sequel, and they'll want another one. Peter was a sophomore in Homecoming, correct? (It's been a while since I've seen it.) If that is the case, I'm sure the intention is for Tom Holland to have, at the very least, a trilogy of solo films to take him through his high school graduation.

 

[Sean Bryan]

Do they retain any sort of right to include Spider-Man in those titles?

Amy Pascal from Sony said at one point that after the Homecoming sequel, they would likely not partner with Marvel any further. I only read that once and never again so I wonder if the author of the article misunderstood. But if that was a real quote, maybe they're getting all these villains ready for Spidey to fight after Homecomimg 2 is done with.

Though I think it would be a tremendous mistake for Sony to stop cooperating with Marvel. I wouldn't pay to see another Spider-Man that's unconnected to the MCU at this point.

I'm not sure of the specifics of their arrangement with Marvel, but technically they never gave any rights back over to Marvel, they just used Marvel to produce their movie and allowed them to use their character (same version) in the Marvel movies. So maybe they can use Spidey in these non-MCU movies but there has been no indication that they will and it would be colossally stupid (even for them) to sabotage their character again by confusing audiences.

As far as what she said for after Homecoming 2, here is her quote:

“One of the things that I think is so amazing about this experience is that you don’t have studios deciding to work together to make a film very often. In fact it may never happen again, after we do the sequel. Because Sony, and Disney, and Marvel all decided that the right thing to do was to allow Peter Parker and Spider-Man to be in the MCU and to work with the Marvel guys and have them produce this film. And I think that was a very rare thing for three companies to do, and a very brilliant thing for them to decide to do because there are only so many stories that you can tell again and again and again about Spidey, and this is something that we would have never been able to do in any other way. So it was a very selfless thing that very smart on the part of all the companies.”

Now I'm sure some read that and jumped to "she said they're done after the sequel! It'll never happen again!" But I believe what she was saying is that this type of arrangement is extremely rare and unique, you are unlikely to see anyone else ever doing a similar arrangement, and that the specific arrangement they made included Homecoming 1 & 2 and Avengers 3 & 4. That part with those movies is what has been set is stone and planned for so far. But of course it wasn't a deal that is "in perpetuity" without specific plans. Again, some think that means they will sever ties with Marvel once those 4 movies are done, but that's not in their best interest. I'd expect that as long as things go well over the next 3 movies they will continue the collaboration with Marvel. They lose nothing by having Marvel run the production and gain significant positive exposure (and get free advertising) by letting Marvel use Spidey in Avengers movies.

But they are also greedy and stupid and short sighted, so they seem to feel that they need to use other characters under the Spide-Man license to build their own "side" cinematic universe. So I guess that is further evidence that they are just stupid enough to screw up and not continue the arrangement with Marvel after the current plan.