venom: let there be carnage review
It’s perfectly reasonable to acknowledge the mindless fun to be had with 2018’s Venom. Ditto for Venom: Let There Be Carnage. Make no mistake, neither is a good film. And if you care even a little bit about a comics accurate Venom characterization, stay far, far away. Outside of the admittedly excellent VFX and satisfying yet jarringly inconsistent relationship between Venom and Tom Hardy’s squirrely Eddie Brock, there isn’t much here on which to base a recommendation. The middle of the film offers a head-scratching rave scene (yes, Venom attends a rave) that one can guess was intended to deliver a message about acceptance. It simply doesn’t work. Eddie Brock/Venom is supposed to be threatening and murderous. This Venom is child-like and grating. Venom should never be adorned with glow sticks. Venom isn’t Deadpool. Blessed are those going in without prior awareness of the comics. The film plays slightly better when ignoring how far the uber-profitable franchise strays from the source material. The aforementioned rave scene is one of many baffling shifts in tone and attempts at humor that feel more appropriate for a GEICO commercial than a movie with aspirations of joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe. We expected better from you, Andy Serkis. Speaking of Serkis, nothing about his direction stands out from the original. If anything, the dialogue here is lesser than in Venom. The Eddie Brock character experiences no significant developments unique to this film. Carnage, a character historically lacking in depth, is played passably by Woody Harrelson even if the only discernible motivation of his Cletus Kasady is to marry his girlfriend. The Carnage “love” interest, played by Naomie Harris, feels tacked on and wooden in a film that won’t win any awards for acting. I couldn’t have lower hopes for the all but guaranteed Venom 3.