Tom Hardy already has some comic book experience under his belt as Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, one of Batman's strongest foes, and originally he was supposed to play Rick Flag in Suicide Squad. That didn't end up happening, but later this year we'll see leave his mark on the Marvel Comics mythology when he plays Eddie Brock in Venom. Superhero stories are naturally packed with violence (fighting criminals and super villains is messy work, after all), but Venom is unquestionably one of the more violent characters running around the Marvel universe. The Venom movie looks like it will take the same approach with the character, and Hardy sounds like he's excited about this. Talking about the duality of the role and noting how Venom and Eddie Brock have "different sounds," Hardy said the following about the anti-hero's black-and-white morals:
There's that biting-off-heads issue. Which is not what you would expect from, say, Captain America taking down a crook.
Yeah, seeing Captain America bite off a bad guy's head would definitely be a shocking sight, whereas something like that comes with the territory with Venom. Although Venom is best-known as one of Spider-Man's greatest foes, he's gradually morphed into an anti-hero over the years, but that hasn't diminished his habit of taking more lethal measures when dealing with adversaries. The final moments of the last Venom trailer indicate as much when we see him stick out that gross tongue of is, like he's getting ready to chow down on that man. Although we hear Eddie Brock in that same trailer tell the symbiote only to harm people, it just goes to show that in the vein of characters like The Punisher and Spawn, Venom isn't a starring protagonist who falls into the traditional heroic category.
In addition to speaking with Tom Hardy about Venom, EW also chatted with director Ruben Fleischer about Venom's violence tendencies and Eddie Brock having to now share his body with an alien. Reminiscing about how he and his team formed their version of Venom, Fleshier explained:
We talked a lot about a werewolf and what it is when you get infected or bit by a werewolf.
However, unlike the traditional Jekyll and Hyde dynamic, Eddie Brock and the symbiote occupy the same body at the same time, requiring that they learn to coexist together. It's the symbiote who's especially bloodthirsty, but with Eddie's influence, Venom as a whole can be tempered. It's doubtful he'll ever be considered a straightforward superhero, but at least his amazing powers can be used for good in the long run.
Venom hits theaters on October 5, so stay tuned to CinemaBlend for more updates about the movie. In the meantime, check out our 2018 release guide to learn what other movies are coming out later this year, as well as our guide on what other Spider-Man-related spinoffs are in development at Sony.
