The Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters (as no member of the general public will ever call it) is starting to take shape, with the almost as clunkily titled Venom: Let There Be Carnage set for release next year. And if you were wondering what the titular crimson symbiote might look like, some new fan art has now emerged offering an interpretation of how it could be brought to life.
Originating after Venom’s popularity resulted in the character morphing from a villain to an antihero, Carnage is also an extraterrestrial parasite who can bond with humans to create a symbiotic entity. When Eddie Brock was imprisoned after his campaign of retribution against Spider-Man was brought to an end, Venom created a spawn of itself which bonded with Brock’s cellmate, sadistic serial killer Cletus Kasady, who subsequently escaped and went on a murder spree with his newfound abilities.
It’ll be interesting to see how the creature is characterized in the film, as much of what sets it apart, such as being considerably more powerful than Venom and having greater control over its amorphous form, was already used in the first movie with Riot. Although the human Kasady will be played by Woody Harrelson with an unintentionally hilarious wig, the image below by Hibban Mohammed is all Carnage, perfectly capturing the alien’s revolting nature in a single action still.
Like Venom, multiple individuals have played host to the symbiote over the years and formed different variations of the alien, such as Norman Osborn and Ben Reilly, the Scarlet Spider, but of them all, Kasady is the most famous and enduring, and a character so utterly irredeemable will provide a compelling counterpoint to Venom and Brock’s moral ambiguity.
Of course, the first film’s reception was considerably mixed, a major detraction being that it suffered the same pitfall of many effects-heavy movies, featuring a disorienting and poorly-lit climax where two barely distinguishable CG monstrosities batter each other. With Venom: Let There Be Carnage being directed by Andy Serkis, though, who’s spent the last two decades becoming an expert in motion capture both in front of and behind the camera, it’s not too much to expect the follow-up to be less of a visual disappointment, and when Carnage itself is seen, it’ll hopefully look as menacing as this fan art.
