The mediocre half-billion dollar hit keeping an entire shared universe afloat manages to co-exist as a super-sized streaming hit

You’ve got to hand it to Sony for its determination to build a Marvel universe of its very own despite the evidence continuing to stack up that it’s never going to work, although at least Venom: Let There Be Carnage did give the studio’s Spider-Man Universe a stay of execution.

Tom Hardy’s first outing as the symbiotic superhero raced to a massive $856 million at the global box office despite not being very good, which was unfortunately enough to embolden the culprits behind Sam Raimi’s abandoned Spider-Man 4 and the scrapped Amazing Spider-Man saga that as much Marvel content as possible was the way forward.

The fate of Morbius speaks for itself, while the jury is still well and truly out on Kraven the Hunter and Madame Web based on the lack of enthusiasm displayed so far, but at least Venom 3 is on the way to guarantee at least one smash hit considering the second installment still conspired to earn upwards of half a billion dollars from theaters despite releasing in the throes of the pandemic.

Woody Harrelson and Tom Hardy are excellent value for money in the scenery-chewing face off as you’d expect, and director Andy Serkis definitely understands the assignment that nothing about Let There Be Carnage is to be taken even remotely seriously, but being better than its predecessor is hardly the most glowing of recommendations.

Regardless, Venom 2 has shown remarkable staying power to once again emerge as one of streaming’s most popular titles, with FlixPatrol naming it as not just a number one hit on Netflix in several countries, but also a proud resident of the Prime Video Top 10 in an additional 23 nations.