Thunder film critics Payton Runyon and Justice Farver share their insights and opinions after watching one of the most talked about movies out this fall.

Payton-  

On October 5, Venom hit theatres in America. Venom is a movie released by Sony Pictures and produced by Avi Arad, Amy Pascal, and Matt Tolmach. The movie has a budget of around 100 million dollars. Venom did not receive an initial good response by the public or critics, with many titling the movie as mediocre and not living up to its full potential. A lot of this criticism was blamed on the movie taking more of a comedic approach over a darker tone. Most of this is due to the movie receiving a PG-13 rating, limiting the studio’s possibilities for a darker imagining of the Venom character.

In my personal opinion, Venom was a much better film than critics gave it credit for. The movie’s storyline stayed fairly straightforward with good acting. The comedic approach did not ruin it, although a darker take would have made the movie better due to the character Venom being such a deep, dark, and violent character. Having Venom being one my personal favorite comic book characters, I had some issues with the film as well. One of my major critiques is the main villain. The main villain, played by Riz Ahmed, was mediocre in my opinion. I felt the character could have been built more, and although Ahmed did a decent job it did not feel like he put enough passion in the role and it felt rushed. However, I thought Tom Hardy was outstanding as both Eddie Brock and Venom and one of the best people they could have gotten to play the role. Although there most likely is someone possibly better suited for this role, I feel that his performance was well done.

In conclusion, Venom deserves more credit than it has received. Although it is not everything that fans wanted, it was still a good representation of the story of Venom and holds up well as a stand alone Venom film with possibilities of sequels and implementations into the MCU.

Justice-

Venom, Marvel’s newest movie, is a roller coaster of bad reviews and hate towards Tom Hardy. But the jokes on the critics, because it made 80 million dollars on opening weekend. But that’s just the start because in the past three days it’s made more than 140 million dollars (Box Office Mojo). But numbers don’t mean much, so I’ll give you my opinion.

In my honest opinion, Venom was one of the best movies I’ve ever seen. The acting was amazing, the choreography was great, and the overall plot was cohesive and easy to follow. I think that Tom Hardy was perfect for the role of Venom, and I’m not the only one. In an interview with Vanity Fair, Ruben Fleischer, the director of Venom, stated that” There was only one person I thought of to play both Eddie Brock and Venom, and that was Tom Hardy”. Tom Hardy was the perfect fit for Venom, and so was the antagonist, Avi Arad to play CEO of the Life Foundation, Carlton Drake. I think he perfectly displayed the genius and psychopathy of Drake. The last fight scene was… amazing, and in the post-credits we got a Carnage cameo, hinting at a Carnage movie.

This was a really good movie, and I urge you to watch it. Once again, this movie is a testament to how horribly wrong some critics are and how little you should value their opinion.