Venom: Let There Be Carnage
Sony PicturesDoubling down on the chaotic energy of 2018’s Venom, its sequel Venom: Let There Be Carnage fully dives into the relationship between Eddie Brock and his symbiote Venom (both played by Tom Hardy), which would be fine and dandy except it leaves the rest of the movie to be severely underwritten.
Venom: Let There Be Carnage continues the story set forth in the original film’s post-credits scene when Eddie Brock visits serial killer Cletus Kasady (Woody Harrelson) at his cell in San Quentin Prison. Kasady feels a connection to Brock, likely because he senses the same loneliness within him, and will only talk to him instead of authorities. Despite Eddie being an investigative journalist, it is the detective skills of Venom that uncover the location of the corpses of Kasady’s victims. A date is set for Kasady’s execution, and he invites Brock to watch his execution as he was the one who put him there. After some taunting by Kasady, Venom within Eddie lashes out, which causes Kasady to bite Eddie, ingesting some of the symbiote-laced blood and Kasady, with his own symbiote Carnage, busts out of prison and goes on the run.
The thing that is the most frustrating about Let There Be Carnage is there is so much potential for an interesting serial killer investigation film, but instead writers Tom Hardy and Kelly Marcel chose to explore the romantic comedy elements of the film. This describes the relationship between Eddie and Venom extremely well, but Kasady is also given a love interest in the form of Frances Barrison (Naomie Harris), who is also known as a mutant named Shriek. Shriek provides for the totally awesome final fight scene, as her superpower is extremely loud screams, and loud sounds hurt the symbiotes, but so little is explored of Barrison’s and Kasady’s romantic relationship that it’s difficult to care about the character. Kasady even speaks more about his connection to Brock than he does to Barrison throughout the film.
Carnage is meant to be a ruthless villain, and within the body of a serial killer, literally a monster within a monster, Carnage and Kasady could have wreaked some serious havoc but simply don’t. This explains the disconnect between Carnage and Kasady, and how they do not share the same relationship as Eddie and Venom, but to give glimpses of a serious serial killer film and not do it is lame. The origin of Carnage is essentially left for the audience to piece together on their own. At one point, Carnage refers to Venom as his father, and at another point, Venom hides back in Eddie’s body and alarmingly declares “that is a red one” upon seeing Carnage – these are the only two moments that explain the new symbiote’s creation.
That being said, Venom: Let There Be Carnage is at its best when it is delving into the relationship between Eddie Brock and Venom. Director Andy Serkis describes the pair as having an Odd Couple relationship and that is exactly right. Eddie and Venom are rather at odds with each other throughout the film. Eddie is focused on getting his life back together after his career and relationship with Anne (Michelle Williams) are ruined in the first film. While Venom wishes to be a hero so he can bite the heads off of bad guys – he can only survive on brains and chocolate. There are chickens in Eddie’s apartment that Venom is supposed to eat for nourishment, but he becomes attached to them and names the chickens after Sonny and Cher. At one point, Venom grows so frustrated with Eddie that the two essentially break up and Venom leaves Eddie’s body and throws himself a coming-out-of-Eddie party. Hardy is given so many moments to shine in these scenes, and he totally makes the movie.
In the end Venom: Let There Be Carnage seems to be torn between wanting to be two different films. Tonally, the romantic comedy elements and the serial killer elements are at odds with one another, and the film itself is so severely underwritten that it does not seem to matter what direction the film went in anyway. With such a severe lack of backstory for Carnage, Cletus Kasady, and Shriek, it is so obvious that the screenwriters simply do not care about any of these new characters, and even some of the returning ones. And this is cemented with the reveal of Let There Be Carnage’s mid-credits scene. Venom: Let There Be Carnage is the stupid fun one would expect after 2018’s Venom but it’s truly a shame that Venom: Let There Be Carnage is simply a means to an end.