'Venom 2' Is Now Titled 'Venom: Let There Be Carnage' – And Has Been Delayed Eight Months

We all knew the Venom sequel was going to feature the villain Carnage. After all, the red-skinned symbiote and his partner-in-murder Cletus Kasady are the Marvel anti-hero's most well-known villain. And the first film's hilariously ill-conceived credits sequence featured a cameo appearance from Woody Harrelson, complete with a red wig seemingly borrowed from Party City, as an imprisoned Kasady. He even promises that "there's going to be carnage" in a line of dialogue written by humans and approved by a massive company.

But now, the sequel's title is doubling down on this fact. Venom 2 is no more. Say hello to Venom: Let There Be Carnage, a movie title also written by humans and approved by a massive company. Anyway, the title reveal comes coupled with the news that the film has been delayed from late 2020 to mid-2021 because of, you guessed it, the coronavirus pandemic.

The Hollywood Reporter has the news: Venom: Let There Be Carnage has been delayed from October 2, 2020 to June 25, 2021. That eight-month delay makes it one of the productions hardest hit by Hollywood being shut down by COVID-19, alongside another massive sequels like F9 (which was delayed an entire year).

Not much is known about Venom: Let There Be Carnage. We know that Tom Hardy is back as Eddie Brock, who became a super anti-hero after merging with the titular alien entity in the first film. We know that Andy Serkis has stepped into the director's chair, a promising change of pace considering his experience working with motion capture technology and crafting special effects-driven performances. And of course, we know that Hardy will battle Woody Harrelson, whose Cletus Kasady doesn't look quite so bargain basement this time around. Kelly Marcel returns to write the script. But I won't pin the title on her. That's a corporate decision. Surely.

As someone who enjoyed flashes of Venom but found the bulk of it interminable, I'm choosing to look the bright side here. With a delay like this, Sony and Serkis can really hone in on making this good movie that allows the bright spots of the first film (Hardy's deranged performance!) to sing while fixing what didn't work at all (the sluggish plotting and tired villain!).

But there's not getting around it: Venom: Let There Be Carnage is the worst movie title since Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. It can only go uphill from here, right?