Venom: The Last Dance Review

The Venom trilogy comes to a close with Venom: The Last Dance. This closer sees Eddie Brock and his symbiotic buddy face their greatest threat.

Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy) is hiding in Mexico after being framed for murdering Detective Mulligan (Stephen Graham) in San Francisco. Eddie needs to travel to New York so he can clear his name. However, his intended road trip has two major obstacles, a secret division of the American army led by General Rex Strickland (Chiwetel Ejiofor), and the creator of the Symbiotes, Knull (Andy Serkis) who has an opportunity to escape his prison beyond the universe.

Spider-man is one of Sony’s biggest successes. Recently, they gave audiences the Spider-Verse movies and the games developed by Insomniac Games have been critical and commercial successes. Yet Sony have persisted with making the Sony Spider-man Universe (SSU), a series of films based on Spider-man’s rogues’ gallery.

The first Venom movie was a box-office hit even despite negative reviews and Venom: Let There Be Carnage was profitable and achieved mediocre reviews. The two films beyond the Venom series, Morbius and Madame Webb have been cinematic embarrassments. The SSU even tried to insert itself within the MCU since the trailers for Morbius highlighted Michael Keaton’s cameo and the post-credit scene in Venom: Let There Be Carnage showed Eddie getting propelled into the MCU. The MCU kicked Eddie out in the Spiderman: No Way Home post-credit scene. An early gag in the film was Venom saying he had enough of ‘this multiverse shit’ but Sony needs to ride Marvel Studios’ coattails.

The third Venom film was a road movie. Eddie and his Symbiote were travelling from Mexico and landed in the desert, reaching Las Vegas and finding himself in Area 51. Along the way, he meets a family of UFO chasers that feels like the film Hanna when Hanna winds up travelling with a hippy family. The family gives Eddie a charge to see what his life could have been if he settled down and there was a surprisingly warm scene when they sing “A Space Oddity.” Eddie happens to meet an old friend in Las Vegas in what was a massive coincidence.

The story of the film was overstuffed. There were two major threats and it was easy to forget that one exists when the other is on screen. One was an indestructible monster from another dimension and could find Eddie and the Symbiote every time he transformed in Venom, which meant that the titular character was missing for large portions in his final film. It also led to the Symbiote making an illogical decision to transform into Venom so he could dance with Mrs. Chen (Peggy Lu) even though he knew the monster was hunting him. Knull was the big baddie of the film, an all-powerful being but he hardly made an appearance. The MacGuffin of the film was ‘the codex’ and that brought back memories of Man of Steel. The film doesn’t explain why Eddie needed to go to New York to clear his name.

The military storyline had different views happening simultaneously. There was a crash between the army led by Strickland who wanted to kill Venom and Teddy Payne (Juno Temple), the head of the science division who wanted to work with the Symbiotes. Payne was given a lot more backstory than expected since there were flashbacks between her and her brother. Strickland had a boss, who had an all-seeing eye of monitors and felt like he was going to the big shadowy villain who was really in control, despite Venom: The Last Dance being meant to be the last film. He was like The Gentleman in the Amazing Spider-Man movies. The final spinning plate in the part of the film was the idea that Area 51 was being decommissioned.

The final storyline involved the Moon family, who were travelling the Extraterrestrial Highway to Area 51. They were meant to offer quirky comedy because the parents were so enthusiastic whilst their daughter was meant to be the normal one in their unit.

Venom: The Last Dance wanted to be an emotional send-off to the series. This was most evident towards the end of the film where there was a montage showing the bond between Eddie and the Symbiote. The filmmakers were attempting to make Venom: The Last Dance into Lord of the Rings: Return of the King or Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. But the Venom movies have been too light-hearted and silly for the final film to have an air of seriousness. The post-credit scenes also leave the door open for a continuation, and if Venom: The Last Dance is a financial success, Sony executives will try and find a way to make a fourth film.

There were some fun moments in Venom: The Last Dance. When Venom fought a gang who operated a dog fighting operation it felt a bit like the comics since he was an anti-hero who did the right thing. There was a fun sequence when Eddie and the Symbiote were being chased by a special forces unit and the symbiote had to possess some of the local wildlife. The action was decent enough and it felt less like CGI blobs fighting each other.

Venom: The Last Dance was an overly chaotic film that was desperately trying to be earnest. It’s one of the better films in the SSU but that’s not saying much.