Hitting theaters as possibly the most polarizing release on the 2024 movie schedule, Sony’s trilogy-capping sequel Venom: The Last Dance garnered the same mostly dismal critical reactions and fandom praise that were expected. Its domestic box office skewed lower than anticipated, though it essentially made its budget back with international grosses. Clearly, there are millions of fans who don’t want the pop culture-savvy symbiote to disappear forever, and I am all up in that group.
Realistically speaking, Venom’s chances of returning are massively high, albeit in a capacity that possibly won’t have Tom Hardy or any other trilogy creatives attached. That’s all good, since studios gotta make that money, but I think there’s a happy medium where the comic anti-hero’s theatrical antics can co-exist with another project that continues to explore the endlessly enjoyable dynamic between Hardy’s Eddie Brock and his inner alien Venom.
We All Expect Venom To Arrive In The MCU For Spider-Man 4, Right?
Just to get this out of the way up top, I can absolutely understand why some Marvel fans take issue with Sony’s Venom movies for never delivering a Spider-Man crossover of any kind, and for not explaining a clear reason by this point. But I definitely believe that the symbiote character will make his way into the MCU by the time Spider-Man 4’s release date rolls around in 2026, and will likely show up in whatever other upcoming Spidey movies are on the way.
Therefore, I am working with the certainty that Kevin Feige & Co. will tackle the action-packed, comic-specific elements with all the CGI aplomb that fans want, perhaps without as many other murky plot elements and under-utilized A-listers filling roles. My own biggest complaint about the Venom trilogy is that talents like Woody Harrelson and Juno Temple are strapped with exposition duties, while Tom Hardy gets all the good shit. But MCU writing teams will figure that stuff out.
So keeping in mind that none of that badassery would get replaced by what I’m about to bring up, and would only be supplemented by it, let’s jump into where I’d love to see Hardy’s Eddie and Venom show up next.
Somebody Give Venom And Eddie A Standalone, Shortform, Extreme Comedy Series
The best thing about Venom was easily the bizarro relationship Tom Hardy carried on with himself as both Eddie Brock and the Bane-esque voice of Venom. And Hardy and screenwriter Kelly Marcel surreally upped that ante in Let There Be Carnage by giving the characters the melodramatic emotional arc of a romantic relationship, while The Last Dance was driven by their eventual break-up, so to speak.
With all the plot mechanics and world-building pressure scraped away, however, Eddie Brock and Venom could engage in a mindlessly hysterical co-existence in a variety of everyday encounters, mishaps, and shenanigans that go completely sideways and presumably conclude with at least one person losing their head down Venom's throat. Like Mr. Bean, but with more tentacles and head-scarfing.
Sure, I'd love full-length episodes of an Eddie-Venom buddy comedy, but I obviously get that even if it's just Tom Hardy on the screen without massive amounts of CGI, it'd be an expensive project, so I'm all about scaling the budget down however possible while still upping the laughs. If it would be easier to make the whole thing an animated series, it would lose the element of live-action discomfort on Hardy's face, but would be able to go even harder on over-the-top sequences.
I'm not so loony to think that Adult Swim will step in and snatch this idea up, or that Peacock, Netflix, Paramount+, Hulu, Disney+, Prime Video, or Max would also be in line to make it happen. But I'm crazy enough to say that every one of them should make shortform Venom series, and there should be a tournament to see which one is the best. And then even that gets animated, and so on, and so on.
Okay, that last idea was really stupid, so we can leave that one for Knull to (k)mull over. But I'm 100% sincere about wanting to see many more offbeat sub-adventures between Hardy's Eddie Brock and the wisecracking symbiote who stole his heart, and all the other body parts.
For now, though, Venom: The Last Dance is currently in theaters.
