“Venom” lacks potency
Venom” stars Tom Hardy as Eddie Brock, a modern news reporter with his eyes set on shining a light wrong doings via his television news show. Following a confrontation with successful entrepreneur Carlton Drake (Riz Ahmed) about his company the Life Foundation, Eddie finds himself tangled in a much more serious situation than he had expected.
“Venom” is based on the characters and storylines from Marvel comics. The title character is one of the most wellknown villains/ antiheroes in Marvel comics.
Riz Ahmed’s character in the film discovers a different life form from an outer space investigation. He decides to have the specimens brought to Earth to study and possibly use them for human benefit. Through studies, he discovers that these “symbiotes” as he calls them, have the potential to be extremely beneficial in curing many deadly diseases. He begins to push for trials with humans, attempting to merge human and symbiote into one superior being. After merging with one of the symbiotes, Eddie Brock the reporter makes it his duty to stop the Life Foundation from its unethical practices and preventing any other symbiotes from causing harm.
Being a film based on a very violent and vicious character, “Venom” was surprisingly light-toned and an easy watch. Director Ruben Fleischer took things on a more light-hearted path by incorporating humor into the script. Both Eddie Brock and Venom are extremely entertaining to watch, and this is mostly because of their quips and jokes.
The downside to having the entire movie feel so relaxed is that was hard to become invested in the story and the personalities. Up until the third part of the movie, there didn’t really seem like there was anything at stake whatsoever. It was easy to see the focus of this film was not the story. Throughout most of the movie, there is no clear direction as to what our protagonist is trying to accomplish.
This is a very entertaining and enjoyable watch but it comes across as just a showcase of the character of Venom and his witty personality as opposed to a well-developed story.