Venom The Official Rate & Review Venom Thread (SPOILERS!!!)

[Mysteryman]

I will say, of all the bad films I've seen this year, this one was at least interestingly bad. I could not help but feel that the filmmakers(and especially Tom Hardy) realized how stupid this project was and just decided to run with it. All of the weird, out of place, silly and stupid scenes in this movie were by far the most entertaining. It's bad and I can't in good conscience recommend it, but at least it wasn't boring.

By far the biggest mystery of this film is why in the hell Michelle Williams ever agreed to this.

I read in an online interview that she did it because she wanted to work with Tom Hardy.

 

[The Slang]

Wow... this movie is stupid. Like, really stupid. Nothing makes sense. The effects are bad. Acting is bad. It's hyperactive. Everything is really fast paced, over the top and silly. Nothing is serious, or subtle. Yet, despite all of that, I liked it. It was never boring. I was entertained the whole time. It was funny, both intentionally and unintentionally. Tom Hardy gives a really eccentric performance, and his interaction with the symbiote is great. I had fun. Very conflicted on this.

At most, I think it deserves a 6/10. But it's more entertaining than many of the MCU movies.

Now, about the origin of Venom. They pretty much ruined it. Complete absence of Spider-man. What's frustrating though, is that they could have easily fixed this with 2-3 simple rewrites. I'll explain how (spoilers):

In the first 5-10 minutes of the movie, Eddie Brock and his fiance are on a date, and they mention some 'Daily Globe incident' that resulted in Eddie being run out of New York.
Here's what they should have done: Change 'Daily Globe' to 'Daily Bugle' and have Eddie's fiance say something like 'Weren't you pretty much fired and run out of New York because of Spider-man?' Eddie looks away, irritated and simply says "I don't want to talk about Spider-man"

Next, there is a subplot in this movie involving the Riot symbiote. For some reason, one symbiote gets separated from the others at the beginning of the movie. While the rest of the symbiotes go to the life foundation, one of them travels through Malaysia, jumping from host to host, before getting on a plane and arriving... at the life foundation. It's a completely stupid and pointless detour that happens for no reason what so ever.
Here's what they should have done: It should have been the venom symbiote that goes on a journey, jumping host to host, before arriving at the life foundation. Only, the venom symbiote isn't separated from the others at the beginning of the movie. Instead, it's already on earth at the beginning. The venom symbiote senses the arrival of the other symbiotes, and travels to the life foundation to confront them. Here, it bonds with Eddie Brock.

Next, right after venom first appears on screen, he escapes the life foundation and there's a scene where Eddie and the symbiote have a conversation. All you need is an extra 10-15 seconds of dialogue here.
Here's what they should have done: When we first see venom, he has the white spider logo on his chest.

Eddie: what's with the uh, chest... the spider?
Symbiote: Oh. Spider-man. We... spent some time together a while back.
Eddie: I hate that guy.
Symbiote: That's something we have in common.

DONE. You can keep the rest of the movie exactly the same, just throw in these minor changes and you completely fix Venom's origin. Easy.

 

[terry78]

That would make too much sense.

 

[Lantern Venom]

I'll post more in depth thoughts later, but at the :50 mark, this was how I felt walking out of the theater.

 

[Boom]

This movie sucked. Having said that I didn't hate it.

Bring on Cletus, I guess.

 

[Primal Slayer]

Just saw it and it was...ok. Not horrible, not good but ok. A very simple no brain cells used type of movie. A review I saw summed this up perfectly: This is a movie that feels very 2000.

Sucks that Venom wont be a Spiderman villain and has been watered down but it had its moments.

 

[Primal Slayer]

By far the biggest mystery of this film is why in the hell Michelle Williams ever agreed to this.

Not so much of a mystery since she gave an interview about it lol. She knows comic films are all the rage and bring in the bucks so she wanted to do one so it would help her secure financing for her smaller films.

 

[Jekecy]

Both Hardy and Williams should be ashamed over ever agreeing to make this. With their prestige and skill, this fame chasing is simply beneath them. Has me looking at them a little differently to be honest.

 

[Schlosser85]

Meh, Williams candidly admitted she did it to help herself afford the smaller indie movies she prefers. Can't really hold that against her, IMO.

Hardy claims he did it for his son, though I'm not sure how much of a gift that is, lol.

 

[Primal Slayer]

It is such a normal thing for actors to do as they get older. Either it is for their kids (Laurie Metcalf only did Supergirl because her daughter was a super fan) or to help fund future endeavors since it's the only way it'll get done. Gotta do what you gotta do in Hollywood.

 

[BH/HHH]

I saw Venom today, it’s definitely not a great movie but it’s nowhere near been a bad one imo.

The opening set up felt rushed as we see Eddie Brock hit rock bottom. Then on the flip side it probably takes a little too long to get to the Venom part. Still the moment he becomes Venom in all his glory is brilliant.

You’ll either love or hate Tom Hardy’s bat**** crazy performance. For me the strength of the film is with the relationship between Eddie Brock and the Venom symbiote. Their interactions were great and hilarious at times. Can’t help thinking if they’d really pushed the conflict a bit more later on and made this film R rated it would have made a big difference.

Personally I thought Riot was a poor choice for villain. Cliche and predictable for sure. Still I can’t help but wonder how hard it must have been for the animators to do the CGI for the symbiote fight at the end.

I didn’t stay for the end credits tag but I did remain for the middle one. It probably should have got me excited but it didn’t as I couldn’t stop staring at that

Spoiler

wig on Cletus Cassidy. I mean really they thought that looked good?

Still I’d recommend Venom and maybe slightly generous give it a 7/10 cause it’s probably more a 6.5 but I felt 6 was too low.

Looking back a few pages I think people need to back off people rating a film high numbers. If that is how they feel then they shouldn’t be lambasted for it at all. One of the things that makes me not post on this place much anymore. People getting bullied for having their own damn opinion and ratings needs to seriously ****ing stop.

 

[Schlosser85]

This isn't a good movie. It also isn't the mind-bogglingly horrendous trainwreck some are hyping it up as. It's just meh and feels like a throwback to the '90s/early 2000s and like something CBMs have passed by (seriously, an Eminem song?).

I don't know exactly how I feel about Tom Hardy flailing all over the place, he was a little much sometimes, but at least he was more interesting to watch than anyone else. Michelle Williams was really phoning it in, her acting was as bad as her wig. Riz Ahmed I think did what he could, but he was just stuck with the umpteenth generic one-dimensional Evil CEO type. I guess Ben Mendelsohn was busy.

Some of the humor was effective. I LOL'ed at "*****". Other times it was awkward and cringey.

The weakest part is the climax, where we rush to this super generic and predictable final fight you can see coming a mile away where the bad guy gets his own symbiote and becomes Big Bad Doppelganger to have an obligatory smackdown with the (anti)hero. It was like an even weaker version of the climax of Iron Man, which was the weakest part of that movie.

The special effects are too cartoony, but Woody Harrelson's wig is the worst of all.

 

[Mysteryman]

4/10.
To call this thing a turd in the wind is an INSULT to turds in the wind!

 

[Karelia]

Loved it. Brock/Venom's relationship is great. I like how the symbiote effects Brock throughout the movie. I had fun the whole time. Which is the purpose for movies for me... to enjoy them. I can see why people don't like it. There's definite flaws. But I'm hoping to see this story continue.

 

[JOE]

6 for me. Very surprised with this film. Tons of flaws, but I want a sequel.

 

[BaronZemo]

4/10 and that is generous. This makes ASM 2 look like Logan.

 

[Mysteryman]

6 for me. Very surprised with this film. Tons of flaws, but I want a sequel.

I also want a sequel. Hopefully we can get a better film this time.

 

[The Chris]

2/5 for me. It being a little fun at times doesn't stop it from being trash. It has so much in common with The Predator in that regard for me. Chuckling here and there but at the same time wondering what in the world they were doing. Didn't laugh at most of the jokes. The pacing was atrocious to me as it felt too fast AND dull at the same time. The villain was laughable with not only his dialogue but his complete lack of threat. The script reminded you of 90s superhero embarrassment. The 3rd act action scene was so lazy and lame. At times i couldn't tell what was going on, and The action in general was just there. The only thing i liked was the Eddie and Symbiote dynamic. Everything else was poor.

 

[Mysteryman]

I saw Venom today, it’s definitely not a great movie but it’s nowhere near been a bad one imo.

The opening set up felt rushed as we see Eddie Brock hit rock bottom. Then on the flip side it probably takes a little too long to get to the Venom part. Still the moment he becomes Venom in all his glory is brilliant.

You’ll either love or hate Tom Hardy’s bat**** crazy performance. For me the strength of the film is with the relationship between Eddie Brock and the Venom symbiote. Their interactions were great and hilarious at times. Can’t help thinking if they’d really pushed the conflict a bit more later on and made this film R rated it would have made a big difference.

Personally I thought Riot was a poor choice for villain. Cliche and predictable for sure. Still I can’t help but wonder how hard it must have been for the animators to do the CGI for the symbiote fight at the end.

I didn’t stay for the end credits tag but I did remain for the middle one. It probably should have got me excited but it didn’t as I couldn’t stop staring at that

Spoiler

wig on Cletus Cassidy. I mean really they thought that looked good?

Still I’d recommend Venom and maybe slightly generous give it a 7/10 cause it’s probably more a 6.5 but I felt 6 was too low.


Looking back a few pages I think people need to back off people rating a film high numbers. If that is how they feel then they shouldn’t be lambasted for it at all. One of the things that makes me not post on this place much anymore. People getting bullied for having their own damn opinion and ratings needs to seriously ****ing stop.

It would have been better if they had chosen Carnage as the villain just based on the bright red color of the symbiote alone.
At times, I couldn't tell the two symbiotes apart.
Just one big slog of dark goo.

 

[SpideyZERO]

This is not a good movie by definition, but it's bad **** insane and extremely entertaining. The Room of superhero genre

The 1st half was dull and poorly paced, but once the Venom symbiote got into the picture the movie got extremely crazy in a good way. The whole theater was laughing nonstop at Tom Hardy's over the top performance and his interaction with the symbiote. I really want more of it. The movie ended just as thing got very interesting. Sequel please and please keep the insanity.

I have no idea how to rate this. Um....7/10 thanks to the entertainment value

 

[ludovica]

Sequel please and please keep the insanity.

Very much this.

 

[Schlosser85]

I'm just curious.....did Fleischer actually want Hardy to act this way, or did Hardy just decide to go crazy and Fleischer wasn't firm-handed enough to rein him in?

 

[ludovica]

I'm just curious.....did Fleischer actually want Hardy to act this way, or did Hardy just decide to go crazy and Fleischer wasn't firm-handed enough to rein him in?

From what I read through the lines in interviews, I'd say the second hypothesis seems right.
If that's the case, the movie was a lot better for it.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

I don’t know, Fleischer seems to have a wacky, out there performance in all of his movies, think Woody in Zombieland and Sean Penn in Gangster Squad. This seemed no different to any other Fleischer movie in that regard. To me at least.

 

[BH/HHH]

It would have been better if they had chosen Carnage as the villain just based on the bright red color of the symbiote alone.
At times, I couldn't tell the two symbiotes apart.
Just one big slog of dark goo.

Yeah I totally agree