venom (2018) review
Is it cynical of me to acknowledge that the overwhelming majority of films, like all for-profit businesses, exist primarily to separate you and I from our hard-earned dollars? It’s the reason bad movies get made. All that’s needed is a financier convinced of enough demand to justify the production. As movie fans we hope and pray that said financiers care about the quality of the film as much as they do recouping their investment. One would think the two go hand-in-hand. There are some properties so popular, well-known and/or visually interesting that they’ll find a theater audience seemingly no matter what. Venom is such a property. 2018’s Venom is about as mediocre as it gets in all aspects other than VFX and it grossed almost a billion dollars on a budget of $116 million. It was the sixth-most profitable release of 2018. The movie is undoubtedly fun and as we all know the worst thing a film can be is boring, but no one walked out of Venom feeling like it was anything but a mish-mash of semi-interesting ideas and an off-the-charts cool protagonist. It’s the personification of “meh.” Few would doubt Tom Hardy's star power and ability to put butts in seats. That said, the Venom symbiote is the star here. It possesses a key movie-theater-gold quality: it’s perfectly suited for modern day trailers and marketing campaigns. Venom is the click bait thumbnail of comic book characters. It’s not necessarily criticism to point out that no one read the “Lethal Protector” Venom comics for the story. Similarly to the 1993 all art/little substance comic, the film feels vapid and vacant as if created with a Venn diagram of marketing data and little interest in telling a compelling story. Am I asking for too much? Probably. Every comic book movie can’t be Logan. I’m absolutely glad Venom did well and as a result we’ll get to see a live action Carnage in 2021. Just don’t make me lie to you about how Venom is essentially an extended VFX showcase with no heart and no intention of being anything more than a cash grab. There I go being cynical again.
Venom receives a 5/10 for general audiences and a 7 for people like me that will never pass on a Venom film.