First Venom 3 Reactions: What People Are Saying About Tom Hardy's Marvel Threequel

Every studio wants its own interconnected cinematic universe, no matter how misguided they may seem. Arguably the strangest attempt at a cinematic universe (outside the catastrophic failure of the Dark Universe, RIP) so far is Sony's Spider-Man Universe — formerly known as Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters — a universe of Spider-Man characters that hasn't actually featured Spider-Man at all. Though most of these movies have been both bad and unsuccessful, there is one notable exception in the "Venom" movies.

Indeed, while "Madame Web" and "Morbius" attempted to ride the wave of horrendous yet funny fan reactions to try and go for a "It's so bad it's good" vibe, only the "Venom" films has actually garnered some decent and even good reactions (like our enthusiastic review of the rom-com that is "Venom: Let There Be Carnage"). Much of the success of these movies is due to Tom Hardy playing a weird little guy attached to a bigger weird guy, whose hypnotic performance keeps bringing audiences back to theaters.

While we gear up for Sony's next move, be it "Spider-Man 4" or the long-promised (threatened?) Sinister Six movie, it is time to say goodbye to one of the weirdest superhero trilogies to date. As dreaded as it is anticipated, we're close to the release of "Venom: The Last Dance," which means the first reactions to the film have begun to hit social media, and spoiler alert: they are pretty positive.

The "Venom" movies are full of zany humor, some truly twisted moments of comedic brilliance by Tom Hardy, and some fun "will-they-won't-they" romantic tension between Eddie and Venom. By all accounts, "Venom: The Last Dance" ramps up the wildness of the trilogy to pull off a satisfying conclusion to the trilogy. Look no further than the excited responses from journalists who caught an early screening of the film. The Wrap critic Drew Taylor posted on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter that "The Last Dance" is "The best of the 'Venom' movies — the insanity has been ramped up significantly but so has the heart. It's not perfect but it's super entertaining and there's a giant monster that chews people up and sprays blood out of the back of its head. Pretty nuts." Look out, Gabriel, there's another Malignant entity with gore coming out the back of their head.

Echoing the sentiments of "The Last Dance" being the best of the trilogy, Digital Spy writer Ian Sandwell called the latest "Venom" movie "The most entertaining of the trilogy. It's largely a funny and sweet road trip with Eddie and Venom living their 'Thelma & Louise' fugitive dreams, including car karaoke and dog rescuing." Now, the idea of Eddie and Venom riding off into the sunset — or jumping off a cliff — sounds rather enticing, but Sandwell also alluded to the film being deeper than just laughs, suggesting, "You might even find yourself getting emotional." Is Sony about to make people cry over Venom and Eddie? The self-proclaimed losers? Sign me the hell up right this second.

Along with Hardy, "Venom: The Last Dance" stars Chiwetel Ejiofor (in a confusing bit of Marvel multiversal shenanigans), Juno Temple, Rhys Ifans, Peggy Lu, Alanna Ubach, and Stephen Graham. Kelly Marcel, who wrote the first two movies in the trilogy, made the jump to director in "The Last Dance," drawing from a screenplay she wrote and a story she developed with Hardy.

But what about the villain? "Venom: The Last Dance" will also introduce Knull to the Marvel universe (at least to one of them), and early reactions are highlighting the character as a worthy adversary. In addition to calling the film a "wacky buddy roadtrip that stretches its PG-13 rating as far as it will possibly go," ComicBook.com's Chris Killian calls Knull "creepy" and praises the character's portrayal and how the filmmakers "set him up as a future threat."

Before you start mounting an awards campaign for "Venom: The Last Dance" as the best superhero movie ever made, however, do note that not all reactions are glowing. Jacob Kleinman from Inverse compared the film to "two movies stitched together" and pointed out that at times the film appears to be "Superhero slop (breathless exposition, macguffins, and soulless CGI monsters) that the studio clearly demanded. The result is a mishmash of a movie that sometimes works but ultimately feels like the work of someone who didn't get why the previous 'Venom' movies were good." That last part is strange since, well, "The Last Dance" is written by the same writer behind the first two films in the trilogy.

Likewise, freelance writer Josh Wildling tweeted "Is it perfect? Nah, far from it," yet still called the latest 'Venom' venture "leaps and bounds ahead of ['Venom'] and has a way meatier plot than ['Venom: Let There Be Carnage']." It sure sounds like this is a superhero movie sequel that doesn't crashland (sorry, "Joker" fans). 

"Venom: The Last Dance" opens in theaters on October 25, 2024.