Venom: Let There Be Carnage Release Date Moves Up Two Weeks

There will be carnage! Just a little earlier than we expected.

Sony has once again altered the release date of "Venom: Let There Be Carnage," but this time around, they're giving fans good news. The movie is coming sooner than planned, now slated to hit theaters on October 1, 2021. Yes, you read correctly — instead of being pushed back another year, Eddie Brock's return is now a month away. In less than four weeks, Tom Hardy will reprise the role of Eddie/Venom, to face off against Woody Harrelson's Cletus Kasady, host to the villainous symbiote Carnage.

The Hollywood Reporter broke this news soon after Disney reported the record-breaking box office for "Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings." The latest MCU origin story made $75.5 million over the weekend for a total of $90 million in its first four days of release. Not only did it exceed expectations for a pandemic release, but it broke Labor Day records.

This holiday weekend is usually slow for movies, as attention shifts to the new school year. More significantly, big blockbuster releases generally come much earlier in the summer — but it goes without saying that norms have been out the window this year, especially where movies are concerned. This made the success of "Shang-Chi" all the more exciting for Sony, proof that people are still venturing out to theaters. This also came after the record-smashing "Spider-Man: No Way Home" trailer, which showcased hype for another Sony-Marvel character.

If you've been keeping score for a while now, you know that the Venom sequel has been caught up in the (seemingly endless) movie release date shuffle. Originally meant to open back in October 2020, pandemic shutdowns pushed the release back to September 24, 2021. The film was later delayed another month to October 15. While that's been the official release date for a couple weeks now, there were rumors floating around that the film could be pushed back once more to a very drastic early 2022 release in January. Though those rumors were later dispelled, they weren't entirely out of left field — plenty of other studios have felt need to delay films slated for fall 2021 release,

A few months ago, when big summer releases first found their way into theaters, proclamation that "movie theaters are back" quickly filled the air. But the box office numbers have proven those declarations were much exaggerated. There were a few breakouts among the bunch, but the numbers never quite reached their pre pandemic peaks. On top of that, studios have become hesitant about releasing titles that expect to rake in cash. 

Paramount just recently decided that their safest bet was to delay big releases like "Mission Impossible 7" and "Top Gun: Maverick." In our current circumstance, with the Delta variant on the rise and anti-vaxxers continuing to be the worst, none of these titles can achieve the heights of pre-pandemic times. But for Sony, "Shang-Chi" has proven that success is still possible.