Joshua Smith editor in chief
In the last Venom film of Tom Hardy’s contract, “Venom: The Last Dance” Eddie Brock (Hardy) and Venom (also Hardy) get an entertaining send off with a buddy-cop-style road trip comedy. However, this is frequently interrupted by seemingly half-baked plot paths that lead to nowhere. Much like “Deadpool & Wolverine,” which was released three months before, this movie is great if audiences turn their brains off and just expect entertainment but can disappoint those expecting a coherent story from a character who is notoriously insane. While the movie was originally teased in other films that implied the possibility of Hardy’s Venom crossing over into the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) and interact with Tom Holland’s Spider-Man, this concept ultimately seems to have been scrapped or left ambiguous.
Most of the high points in the movie come from the moments where Venom and Brock bicker while traveling from their hideaway in Mexico to New York City, while being sidetracked by an unregulated amount of Murphy’s Law. Little things like constantly losing shoes, riding on the exterior of a passenger jet, being attacked by special forces, dealing with emotional toll of murder, being attacked by a creature designed to take down Venom, enduring a long van ride with a family of hippies, and handling crippling gambling addiction are just some of the trials our symbiotic duo face. The comedy of Venom and Brock hurling insults at each other is achieved by Hardy recording voice lines for Venom, which are later played back in Hardy’s earpiece while filming his scenes as Brock. This gives him the ability to deliver better timing and reactions, fostering a more natural interaction between the two characters.
If the travel and obstacles had been the focus of the movie, it could have been a much better experience. However, there were many sub-plots that can been seen as forced and put too much emphasis on potential future movies, leaving viewers with open-ended plot holes. Some characters are introduced and built up only to be dismissed, some are inconsistent in their attitudes and interactions with others, and some that are given full back stories that will clearly show up again are in that weird limbo of “defeated but not really so what was the point” or even “just out there somewhere.”
The MCU’s successful slow introduction of the looming threat of Thanos is a high that both Marvel and Sony have been chasing in their films ever since with very little fan buy-in, and Sony’s attempts in this film are no different. Throughout “Venom: Last Dance,” audiences are told of an impending doom at the hands of King in Black, God of the Symbiotes, Null (Andy Serkis), a character that, in the comics, was involved in a very large story arc that was well received and even created symbiote versions of many of the loved Marvel roster. But in a movie that is billed as the last of Hardy’s Venom movies, what is the point?
Sony’s Marvel based movies are mostly Spider-Man movies without Spider-Man in them, with Hardy’s Venom carrying the bulk of the weight and now a major Venom villain on the horizon. If Hardy does not return, Sony will have a movie franchise based around a Venom villain without Venom, who is a Spider-Man villain without Spider-Man. At this point, if Disney’s Marvel and Sony’s Marvel are not able to get Tom Holland into these movies soon, they need to at least bring in a Sony specific Spider-Man to re-energize the franchise. Anything less will make Sony’s future go from Knull in the Void to null and void.