The Issues with Sony’s Spiderman Universe
Can villains/antiheroes be the heads of a franchise?
With the release of two trailers for upcoming movies part of the Sony villain-verse (or whatever it goes by), we have now got at least a glimpse of 5 projects part of this rogue rogues gallery of cinema, with a number more already in pre-production or announced. However, the 3 films so far released have been received as mediocre or worse, and the two new films show the same trajectory. So, what’s wrong? I will analyse the key issues of why these movies are bad, and not just because of the bad guys/girls holding it together.
Without Spiderman, they have less source material to choose from.
Well, the main issue we have is that these films need Spiderman. Some of the characters involved, such as Venom, are intrinsically linked to the web crawler, and it is hard to justify their purpose and give them a motive when Spiderman isn’t involved.
We have now seen two versions of Venom and Spiderman’s relationship within mainstream media (Sam Raimi’s Spiderman 3 and Insomniac’s Spiderman 2) which shows how Spiderman struggles with the symbiote before leading to the symbiote corrupting another, and the fight with New York’s main superhero. To strip these characters of their main being, and therefore the majority of the source material from the comics, means the creative teams have to do something almost impossible — create an original story with a pre-established character which not only satisfies fans, but also is a great standalone movie. So far, that has been too great a task.
They have to make other villains seem worse by comparison
Whilst Morbius and Venom have been depicted as anti-heroes in the comics, they are essentially villainous in nature and antagonists of Spiderman. Their powers do not lend well to being on both sides of heroism — an alien who likes to murder people and a vampire who likes to drink people’s blood — You wouldn’t exactly call them the “loveable” type.
In order to make them appear heroic in any capacity, the villains are so cartoonish and over the top, that the films feel shallow. Carlton Drake/Riot wanted to merge symbiote with human to “save humanity”, and Cletus Kasady was a straight up serial killer (which, in all fairness, follows his comic book counterpart), whilst Lucien Crown of Morbius is a bullied kid with a chip on his shoulder. All 3 show little to no regard for human life, as opposed to the anti-heroes facing them. However, all 3 villains are mirrors to the heroes, though there are no unique parallels or interesting takes on display.
They are fundamentally changing the essence of the characters
As mentioned above, whilst both characters currently featured in the released Sony movies have shown acts of heroism previously, the essence is wrong. Venom is still an evil character, especially when they are introduced in their comics run. Morbius, again, is a thorn in Spiderman’s side, not somebody who is inherently good. He is a tragic character, but not somebody to root for necessarily.
There was a great opportunity to make these films and have Venom or Morbius be the heroes of their own story, like so many films have done before. However, doing it from the villain’s perspective, and viewing their flawed logic first hand and their view of Spiderman being the enemy to their goal. However…
All the films feel the same
Maybe it is due to the way they have to be written in order to make them the protagonist, but the stories feel like the same mid 00’s average superhero film every time. Venom 1 was the villain’s origin, and how he comes to terms with his powers. His love interest is endangered by the villain, and Venom eventually defeats them, before setting up the next movie. Venom 2 is about the relationship between the man and the symbiote, whilst the villain kidnaps the damsel in distress, before being defeated by the “hero” and setting up the next movie(s). Morbius is about him coming to terms with his powers, and his love interest… See what I mean?
The films are so similar in so many aspects, including plots, motivations, and 3rd acts. They throw back, as previously stated, to the rough state of superhero movies in the early to mid 00s, such as Daredevil, Catwoman and Fantastic Four, which tried to capitalise on the success of films like the Xmen, Spiderman and Blade. However, the films struggled because they were not unique — they offered nothing new to the genre. In a similar vein, these Sony films are not doing anything ground-breaking or innovative. There are that many superhero origin films, and that many superheroes in general, it takes real genius to put a new spin on it (the best examples, for me personally, would be Guardians of the Galaxy’s unique comedic style or Wonder Woman’s historical setting.) Without including Spiderman, these films need to be either critically loved or have something engaging for fans, and for me none of these films do that effectively.
The Future — Merging into the MCU
The recent reports in the area suggest that Tom Holland’s next outing as Spiderman may introduce these antiheroes into the MCU as part of the multiversal saga. This has already been teased in two of the 3 Sony movies, with Venom seeing a news story involving Holland and Michael Keaton’s Vulture introducing himself to Morbius. However, this would be bad for a number of reasons, including:
- The tone would be uneven — You have already introduced these villains as not technically bad indivduals, so you would either have to make them team up with spiderman to take down worse threats (Carnage has already been dealt with, thanks Venom) or you would have to make the characters you have already established change back into villainous ways. It would just not be a smart idea.
- It would bloat the MCU further — I am going to write a separate article on this issue, but I feel like the MCU roster is bloated beyond comparison. It reminds me of the final few seasons of the Walking Dead; if you keep introducing new characters and not killing off original characters, there will be lots of characters with no development. Especially in the MCU, with so many A-listers, Kang Dynasty would need to be 6 hours to give everybody 5–10 mins of screentime each.
