Warning: This review contains spoilers.
“Venom: The Last Dance” premiered in theaters on Oct. 24 and grossed over $51 million on its opening weekend. Tom Hardy returned as Eddie Brock and Venom one last time and was joined by Juno Temple as Dr. Teddy Payne, Peggy Lu as Mrs. Chen, Chiwetel Ejiofor as Rex Strickland and Andy Serkis as Knull.
The movie is the final installment of the “Venom” franchise, leaving both Sony and Marvel fans with conflicting views. Some are sad to see Hardy go, while others see this as a way to restart and merge the Sony and Marvel universes. Venom made his on-screen debut in 2018 and is a classic Spider-Man antagonist in the comics, yet not once has he made contact with said character. In fact, the franchise exists in a separate universe from the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). Hardy made a cameo as Eddie and Venom in “Spider-Man: No Way Home” (2021), which insinuated a crossover between the two universes. However, “Venom: The Last Dance” pulls Eddie and Venom back to their universe and shatters the chances of them sharing the big screen with any of Tobey Maguire, Andrew Garfield or Tom Holland’s live-action portrayals of Spider-Man.
I give the movie seven and a half out of 10 stars, based on its quality solely, ignoring comic inaccuracies. The movie focuses on the relationship between Eddie Brock and Venom and gives the latter the ultimate opportunity to be what he’s always wanted to be: “the lethal protector.” The term refers to their classification as an antihero. Venom uses his abilities for good and Eddie consents, and the duo stops antagonists wherever they go, with Venom getting to seriously maim and eat them.
In the movie, we follow Eddie and Venom struggling to recover from the last film’s events. Eddie is framed for multiple murders, and he and Venom decide to start over in New York City (NYC). At the same time, Knull, the film’s villain, has sent his minions, Xenophages, to traverse the universe in search of the Codex — the very thing that will grant him the power to escape from the prison that Venom’s symbiote species put him in eons ago because of his tyranny over them.
The computer-generated imagery of this movie was some of the best I’ve ever seen in the superhero genre. The Xenophages were downright uncomfortable to look at. The depiction of the symbiotes’ transformative transitions were smooth and of high quality, looking and feeling very realistic. Each symbiote was distinct in both appearance and ability. This is the most predominant at the end, when Venom consumes multiple Xenophages who actively fight and tear through his goo. All while this is happening, he spits Eddie out and puppeteers him to safety as well as Strickland to the acid machine control. This leaves room to imagine what kind of other horrors and creatures are lurking in the universe, reiterating a core concept of the franchise. Just because something looks terrifying and has the potential to harm does not mean it intends to do solely that.
The humans in the movie either treat the symbiotes as a thing to study (Dr. Payne and Sadie, another scientist, who is played by Clark Backo) or as an enemy of humankind (Strickland). By having multiple symbiotes take people over in the final fight, it cements the idea that symbiotes and humans are equals and one is not superior to the other.
The dynamic between Eddie and Venom is brilliantly meshed, making the movie all the more thrilling. In the first two movies, a good chunk of the tension comes from their struggle to have a symbiotic relationship. Here, however, they are a united front. Hardy masterfully embodies these characters, especially since he spends so much time in the first two films defining their differences. Eddie is still Eddie and Venom is still Venom, and the care they have for each other can never be taken away.
The film takes their relationship to new heights. On their way to NYC, Eddie and Venom stumble upon a family looking for aliens at Area 51. They offer to drop them off at Las Vegas, Nev., the closest city host to civilization. Along the way, one of the children confesses to Eddie that he hopes he won’t find any aliens because they terrify him.
Eddie comforts him, telling him that aliens aren’t real and even if they were, they wouldn’t hurt him. Venom later tells him that he did the right thing by comforting the child and acknowledging the dangers aliens pose to society. They talk about how a settled-down life would perhaps be better for them. They discuss what new things they want to do and Eddie promises that after all of this is over, he’ll take them to NYC and start over.
Throughout all of the action scenes, it is clear that Venom and Eddie care for each other, and that their relationship is purely symbiotic. When they are attacked by Strickland the first time and separated, Venom jumps from animal to animal and risks exposing his cover to protect Eddie from dying in the waterfall. Whenever Eddie gets hurt, Venom is quick to heal his wounds and defend his honor. When a hotel worker calls him “poorly dressed,” Venom slaps him unconscious. He does the same thing to the man who urinated on Eddie’s feet, ruining his third pair of shoes. And, during the final fight, he spits Eddie out of him as a sacrifice to save them all.r Eddie insisted to Venom that they were a duo and from the start to end of their lives, they’d be in this together.
Their relationship was presented as nuanced, and it is a shame the movie is meant to be their last dance.
“Venom: The Last Dance” masterfully blends comedy, action and emotion.
All of the jokes had good deliveries, from Venom’s wit and intense excitement to get drunk in the beginning, win the jackpot at the casino to get money to continue their path to NYC to when he inhabits the horse (the mere fact that Venom had to coach Eddie about how to approach “the good horsey” is utterly hilarious). The scene where he dances with Mrs. Chen, in which he ends up exposing himself to the Xenophage, was hilarious and intentional. Without the Xenophage tracking Venom to Vegas, the fight wouldn’t have been as quick.
The action scenes were exhilarating and creative. The opening scene with the gang members was fun; because of how well-fleshed Eddie and Venom are as characters, it was cool to see them swap in and out of each other. Seeing Eddie throw punches while Venom stuck his arms out of Eddie’s back to fight others and do cool stunts made the movie all the more entertaining. It was exciting to see a new fighting style in an action film.
Seeing Venom’s head swimming around to help Eddie when they were attacked by the military was unintentionally comedic yet creative. This creativity increased tenfold as he leaped from fish to frog to help him. This urgency and dedication comes right off the screen in how fiercely Venom is willing to protect Eddie, allowing the audience to truly feel for them and making their last appearance all the more emotional and strong. Even viewers who haven’t watched the other movies in the franchise will feel sad saying goodbye to these characters.
Eddie and Venom are “the lethal protector” with no strings attached to anything else except the job and each other. When Eddie is injured by a Xenophage to give Venom cover, Venom exposes himself and heals him. When they walk out, determined to end this once and for all (the plot entails that if one or both of them die then the Codex is gone forever because their symbiosis makes it a part of them both), Venom spits Eddie out of the symbiosis at the last minute and sacrifices himself; he tells Eddie that he’ll never forget him nor his friendship to a teary-eyed Eddie who promises the same.
The movie’s simplicity is refreshing because every detail is intentional — especially the details that come off as annoying and irrelevant on a first glance. I didn’t understand the drawn-out screen time dedicated to Strickland operating the acid dump machine, the focus on Sadie and the eccentric family that Eddie and Venom encounter en route to New York. These scenes appear as wasteful, taking valuable time away from the main characters, but every detail comes into play later.
We’re shown these details not only for foreshadowing, but to surprise the viewers without reducing shock value. The acid waste scene demonstrates this; when Venom drags himself and the symbiotes there, you don’t anticipate what he will have Stickland do until he stands and directly parallels the first and only other time the machine is used.
Sadie is a minor but constant character. She displays odd behavior at times that makes the viewer wonder if she might betray the lab or steal a symbiote, since she expressed attitudes in line with both Dr. Payne and Strickland who share polarizing views on the symbiotes and aliens. When Eddie is shot, it is revealed that she let Venom infect her and transfer him to Eddie, saving his life. During the final fight, she insists a symbiote infected her and willingly risks her life to fight the Xenophages, nearly dying several times.
I didn’t see her character arc coming but enjoyed it nonetheless. I believe that the core concepts of the trilogy are suspense, action and deceit. My only critique is the handling of Dr. Payne, the lead scientist investigating symbiotes, who is the only voice outwardly expressing a positive outlook on the symbiotes in the military. She exhibits lightning-induced trauma because it struck her as a child, which left her permanently scarred and killed her brother. At the end, she infects herself with a lightning-powered symbiote to save Sadie. I suppose the scene was meant to fulfill her arc since she was the only character until that point who hadn’t changed, but she was uninteresting and underutilized, making me feel nothing for her throughout the film.
I’m also not a fan of conclusive character endings, especially when I firmly believe this movie will not be the last time we see Venom. I would’ve liked Hardy’s character to appear alongside one of the three live-action Spider-Man actors and would hate to see someone else play the roles of Venom and Eddie, which Hardy embodies so well.
Final Score: 7.5/10
