The Symbiotes Come to Town

It’s weird to think how long Sony tried to make their Spider-man without Spider-man film universe work. It was a terrible idea from conception, the idea that they could take Spidey’s villains, the truly evil guys that had been harrassing Peter since day one, and somehow turn them into protagonists. Characters like Morbius and Madame Web and Kraven the Hunter (and don’t worry, we’ll get to him soon enough). These were characters defined by their relationship to Spidey and how they played off of him. No one was asking for a Green Goblin film because that wouldn’t make logical sense. Goblin is Spidey’s villain and if you don’t have Peter in the film what is even the point of the villain?

This was detail lost on the Sony execs who simply saw that they had a library of characters they’d licensed from Marvel and they wanted to do something with them. And, let’s be clear, there were characters that could have supported this. Black Cat is one, as she’s a heroine that wouldn’t need much modification to fit into the basic superhero mold. Silk is another. She’s great, has a conjoined origin story with Peter, and could be a great heroine in her own adventures (just like she is in the comics). In that whole repertoire of superheroes, Sony could have reached in and struck gold more than once instead of, you know, Madam Webb.

Of course, Sony decided the first, best choice for a solo film was VenomSpun out from a "What If?" story in Marvel Comics, this black suit variant of Spider-man became his own character, and eventually became almost as popular as the web-head himself.. They’d wanted a Venom solo film for years and years, shoe-horning the character into Raimi’s Spider-man 3, something the director hated. They’d planned to spin the character off, giving him a solo adventure, but the third Raimi film wasn’t as well received, and the studio then spent a long time out in the weeds trying to get back on track. Getting SpidermanSure, DC Comics has Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman, but among the most popular superheroes stands a guy from Marvel Comics, a younger hero dressed in red and blue who shoots webs and sticks to walls. Introduced in the 1960s, Spider-Man has been a constant presence in comics and more, featured in movies regularly since his big screen debut in 2002. into the Marvel Cinematic UniverseWhen it first began in 2008 with a little film called Iron Man no one suspected the empire that would follow. Superhero movies in the past, especially those not featuring either Batman or Superman, were usually terrible. And yet, Iron Man would lead to a long series of successful films, launching the most successful cinema brand in history: the Marvel Cinematic Universe. was a huge step, and it revived all their spin-off ideas until, finally, we did get a Venom solo joint and it worked reasonably well. But Sony learned the wrong lesson, thinking that villains were the key instead of the fact that Venom worked because the character had been headlining his own adventures in comics for years. No one wanted to see Spidey villain in their own films, they just wanted to see Venom.

After many years of trying, and failing, to get any of the other villain characters off the ground and working, Sony has essentially thrown in the towel. They suffered failure after failure, with even the Venom films finding diminishing returns at the Box Office, and now with both Venom: The Last Dance wrapping up its trilogy, and then Kraven bombing had after, Sony has said their extended universe of Spider–man villains (whatever they called it from one month to the next) was over. No more. They were going back to just focusing on Spider-man. Which, good. I’m glad. But at the same time, there has been some cheesy fun to be had in these shitty, shitty movies.

Take Venom: The Last Dance. I am not arguing that it was a good film by any measure. I wouldn’t make that argument for any of these films as Venom was delightfully watchable but also bad while Venom: Let There Be Carnage was just bad, no delight to be had. All three films were powered, almost entirely, on the strength of Tom Hardy’s performance as both Eddie Brock and Venom. There’s a delightful chemistry between the two characters, with scripts co-written by Hardy himself. He loves this character, it’s clear, and that comes across on the screen. He makes these films watchable.

And it’s a good thing, too, because without him having fun and just enjoying the ride, Venom: The Last Dance would be an absolute dog. The film is about a symbiote god, Knull (Andy Serkis) who has been awoken by the bond between Eddie and Venom after Venom saved Eddie and brought him back to life. Within the two they share a magical connection, a “codex” and if that codex could be harvested it could be used to unlock the seal keeping Knull imprisoned, setting him free to dominate the world. So Eddie and Venom go on a road trip to escape Knull’s minions and try to stay alive. Oh, and there’s a government agency that collects symbiotes and imprisons them for… reasons. Really, none of it matters.

Venom: The Last Dance is one of the most pointless and empty stories I’ve seen in some time. The essential point of the film is that Eddie and Venom cannot be together anymore because if they act as a combined whole, the true Venom hero, the symbiote hunters will track and kill them. To anyone logical this would mean Venom should move on and bond with someone else. That’s a five second fix. Both characters say their goodbyes, Venom moves on, story over. But no, we get 109 minutes of faffing around for no reason as Venom and Eddie put so many people in danger because they just can’t separate themselves. It’s truly stupid and pointless.

But at the same time, if you can just ignore the film, there’s a lot of amusement to be had from it. That’s because so much of the film is just Eddie and Venom bickering like an old married couple. I’ve seen reviewers call these films romantic comedies between a boy and his symbiote, and that’s on full display here. Eddie and Venom care about each other, even love each other, and it’s a sweet, solid bond that works through all their scenes. If what you want from these films is Eddie and Venom cracking jokes, being weird, having fun, and just being the odd couple then the film works.

Oh, and there’s a sequence where Mrs. Chen (Peggy Lu) gets shoehorned in for no reason and while it’s all really dumb and makes no sense, it is capped by Venom and Chen dancing a rehearsed number to Abba’s “Dancing Queen”. I didn’t expect something like that in a Venom film and while it shouldn’t work on any level it is, honestly, one of the highlights of the film. The dancing in Spider-man 3 was awful and rightly mocked and yet now it’s all we have to hold onto here.

There are times where the film has fun and lets loose. A sequence of Venom bonding to a horse and traveling across the countryside is great fun and totally suits the zany logic of this film. And then it’s ruined by government agents somehow tracking them instantly and appearing right on top of them with no logic as to how. Similarly, the climax of the film has a bunch of symbiotes bond to humans, leading to a massive, all out battle between symbiotes and hunters, and it’s gleefully awesome. But then the film disposes of so many of them and makes you question why they were even included at all. Every good decision is followed by a bafflingly stupid one and it just doesn’t work, long term.

Venom: The Last Dance is a film about moments. Not story, not what could come next, not even any of the characters outside of Brock and Venom. It’s the moments that make the film watchable. This isn’t a good film by any measure, and it’s hard to recommend it to anyone, really. You have to be here just for the moments that work, fleeting as they are, because there’s little else to hold onto here. This is a bad movie and it’s a good thing Sony is finally letting go of this whole stupid plan. But it will be sad to see Hardy’s Eddie and Venom exit, stage left. Their movies were awful, but even here they’re the best thing in this whole Sony ‘verse.