Well, Venom finally screened for critics tonight and unfortunately, it’s looking like Sony’s newest franchise is off to a pretty rough start.
Admittedly, ever since the studio announced their plans to build a Marvel universe using the Spider-Man characters they still had the rights to, fans were skeptical. I mean, it’s difficult to imagine how you can have Venom or Kraven the Hunter running around in a world without Spidey. But Sony was confident it could work and went ahead and announced a whole bunch of spinoffs before the franchise even took its first step into theaters.
Now, though, Venom has screened and just as we thought, it’s far from the home run the studio was surely hoping it would be. Though full reviews are still under embargo, social media reactions have begun to surface and let’s just say it ain’t pretty, with some folks calling the film a complete failure and comparing it to the dreadful Fantastic Four reboot. Ouch!
To be fair, it’s not all bad, and a lot of people are praising Hardy’s performance, but on the whole, it sounds like critics aren’t impressed by what they saw and here’s just a sampling of what they’re saying so far:
#Venom is Catwoman level bad, with Tom Hardy's worst performance since This Means War.
DON'T SEE THE MOVIE!— Daniel Richtman (@DanielRPK) October 2, 2018
Tom Hardy as Eddie Brock and #Venom has some really entertaining moments. A clunky script without nuance bogs the #Venom down, preventing it from choosing between being gritty, funny, or something unique.
— BD (@BrandonDavisBD) October 2, 2018
Significant chunks of #Venom don’t work *at all* but there is some serious charm to the Eddie/Venom relationship. Not sure I had the intended reactions to some scenes but fun is fun – even when it’s totally ridiculous, right? It’s too bad they didn’t go for the R rating though.
— Perri Nemiroff (@PNemiroff) October 2, 2018
#Venom wasn’t as bad as everyone was saying it was going to be. Tom Hardy is and always will be a great actor, and I laughed a lot — but I’m not sure whether that was intentional or not. Post-credit scene is 🔥
— Beatrice Verhoeven (@bverhoev) October 2, 2018
https://twitter.com/rustypolished/status/1046988864513032203
https://twitter.com/treadtalks/status/1046987367142383616
https://twitter.com/sylvioso/status/1046989597438353415
Sorry to say that #Venom is pretty much a complete failure – a tonal mess that feels 15 years old, ignoring the storytelling strides that the superhero genre has made in recent years.
A few fun Venom-centric moments aside, it has nearly nothing to offer. Don't get your hopes up.
— Tom Jorgensen (@Tom_Jorgensen) October 2, 2018
Rough, eh? I mean, we had our doubts about Venom, just as most people did, but to hear it being compared to Josh Trank’s Fantastic Four and Catwoman is incredibly concerning and has us questioning where Sony will go next. They’ve already announced spinoffs for Kraven the Hunter, Morbius, Silk and more, but will they soldier on and hope for a better future, or could the reception to Venom force them to scrap the whole endeavor before it even really gets going?
That’ll probably all come down to the box office numbers. Thankfully for the studio, then, estimates are pretty positive, with analysts predicting a huge opening for Venom. Then again, once reviews get out there and word of mouth starts to spread, that could change. Either way, it’ll be fascinating to see how the film performs and what shape the studio’s cinematic universe will take from here on out.