Venom

And so, everyone, we're at one of the more curious and slightly anticipated comic book movies of this year and one that I was personally kinda cautious about, Venom. Spider-Man has always been my favourite superhero of all time and Venom has always been one of my favourite Spider-Man villains of all time, just behind the Green Goblin. So seeing a horrible portrayal of him in Spider-Man 3 was sorta hard to watch. With there being a remake for him being made, it got a lot of people excited, but then the trailers came out and every time I showed them, I kept saying that I didn't think any of them looked good. And I was absolutely right. This is a pretty bad movie in my opinion. I was honestly not surprised, again, given how the trailers looked and the fact that there was a production mess with this. So, before I get into why I think this movie is bad, let's go through the story. And, also, this will have all the spoilers in it from the start because, personally, I don't think you should go see this. So, what's the story? Eddie Brock, played by Tom Hardy, is a reporter who's about to interview a man named Carlton Drake, played by Riz Ahmed, who's discovered symbiote and is using people to test them, which causes them to die. When Eddie begins snooping around one of the labs, he finds one of the symbiotes which bonds with him and he begins to hear a voice in his head. All while he thinks he's going crazy, Carlton knows that Eddie has it so he sends his men to get it from him. However, the symbiote, called Venom, is now able to come out at points throughout Eddie's body and is able to fight and make him attack people, even show himself entirely at points. And so now it's up to Eddie and Venom to stop Carlton, who's bonded with another symbiote called Riot, from bringing other symbiotes from their world to this one and killing everyone. Okay, first, let's go over the very small good things in the movie. The one actor I would say that actually feels like he does a good job is Tom Hardy. The character he's given to play is kinda weird and awkward at points, but, Tom Hardy actually does do pretty well with what he's given and I think he is good in the role. The special effects, while some C.G.I is really horrible, some of them, especially the Venom effect itself, looks really good in my opinion. And, honestly, the best thing this movie has going for it is the actual Eddie and Venom dynamic. Whenever they're interacting and arguing, it's really good. That's the one thing everyone says is the only good thing here, and, yeah, it's definetly the best part of the movie, and there were actually really funny moments, especially one scene involving Venom calling Eddie a wimp for taking the elevator instead of jumping out of a window. And, that's really it. The rest of the movie is just really, really bad. Not only is the writing really bad here, but also the pacing, editing and other performances. The first part of this reminded me a lot of Fant4stic. As in the first part of this movie is way too slow with way too much setting up that it's just incredibly boring and I never cared for any of these characters throughout the movie's long runtime. The pacing is also just bad in the sense that scenes end way too quick, but at the same time, the scenes themselves feel really slow, and not in a good way. It's unlike the M.C.U movies where scenes can be slow, but, unlike the M.C.U where they're slow and characters are interacting, this one is just boring because I didn't care for anything anyone was saying. As far as the other actors here, Riz Ahmed is pretty bad as Carlton. I haven't seen Nightcrawler yet, so I can't really defend him there, but just from this performance alone, given the fact that he's just another generic, boring, crazy villain, he has some of the worst supervillain scenes in a comic book movie I've seen in a long time. Michelle Williams as Anne, A.K.A, Eddie's girlfriend, is also pretty bad. Again, haven't seen Manchester By The Sea, so I'm sure she's an amazing actress, but this just isn't a role she's good in. As far as the other special effects in the movie, I mentioned how the Venom effect looks awesome, and it does, but the rest of them are pretty bad. Especially the ending, which is just another one of those same suit wearing people fighting each other, and it is. One of the many things we get in comic book movies sometime, and this might be the worst I've ever seen. Because Venom and Riot are both dark coloured slime monsters, and the fact that the climax takes place at night, you really can't tell what's happening. It's kinda cool to see Venom and Riot interacting, but it's very short and you don't see that much of it. Same with Eddie and Venom. While it's definetly the best part of the movie, you don't really get to see much of Venom and Eddie interacting. The film also has so many scenes that are really inconsistent. Whether it's breaking it's own rules or people just act out of the ordinary and it feels really unnatural, even for a comic book movie. I will sy this though, while the beginning and end are pretty bad, the middle is actually kinda good and kinda entertaining. The action itself, like through the rest of the movie, is also disappointing. Plus, do I even need to mention the rating. Either you know what happened or you don't. But, in case you don't, this was supposed to rated R, which is something a lot of people, myself included, would have loved to seen, especially since FOX has been able to do it really well with Deadpool, Deadpool 2 and Logan. And here, where it looks like there should be some kinda graphic stuff here and blood, there's either none of it or they cut away whenever Venom is about to eat someone. And, apparently, Sony did it because they wanted to have it tie into other Marvel properties considering Spider-Man movies aren't rated R. Which is just so dumb, but Sony does seem to be the company that would do that. And I would have loved it if this was R rated. And then, finally, the end credit scene is... well... you've seen the movie already, then you know what happens, but, if you don't, it involves Eddie going to interview Cletus Kasady in prison. And, let me just say, it's probably the most cringeworthy, forced and cheesy supervillain setup I've seen in a long time. Especially when he says "There's gonna be Carnage." That honestly made me slap myself in the face because of how stupid it was. It was even delivered in a stupid way. But, ya know what? I think I actually do want to see a sequel to this where Venom takes on Carnage. Woody Harrelson does look pretty good as Cletus. He's undeniably really over the top, but I think a sequel to this, if they actually get a team that can make it work and make it good, I think would be cool to see. Personally, like everyone, I do want to see Venom return to the M.C.U and fight Spider-Man, and for real this time, but see a good sequel to this before that would be awesome, but, again, only if it's good. As for this movie itself, it's just really bad. There are some good things in it, but the negatives overshadow the positives. It's mostly just bland mess with sloppy made filmmaking. I'd honestly say skip it. It's really not worth your time.