FromMorbiustoKraven the Hunterto theVenomfilms,Sony’s live-action Spider-Verse franchisedefines everything that’s wrong with comic book movies. A few years ago, whenAvengers: Endgamebecame the highest-grossing movie ever made andJokerbecame the first R-rated film to cross $1 billion at the box office, the comic book movie genre seemed unstoppable. However, superhero fatigue has well and truly set in and a generic, formulaic comic book movie with a recognizable I.P. in its title just won’t do anymore.The Flash,Shazam! Fury of the Gods, andAnt-Man and the Wasp: Quantumaniahave all been critical and commercial disappointments.
The biggest superhero hits of 2023,Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3andSpider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, have proven that the solution to superhero fatigue is very simple: make good movies. If a comic book movie is truly great,tugging on the heartstrings likeGuardians Vol. 3or imbuing the visuals with real invention and creativity likeAcross the Spider-Verse, then audiences will show up. The absolute worst that the superhero movie genre has to offer is personified by Sony’s feeble attempts to build out its own Marvel Comics-based cinematic universe.
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Venom And Venom 2 Were Underwhelming
The biggest box office hits of Sony’s live-action Spider-Verse franchise have been theVenommovies. But those movies have weak scripts and rushed pacing, and they reduce the complicated eponymous antihero into a traditional protagonist who defeats the villain for the sake of good.Tom Hardy has been carrying the entire franchiseon his shoulders. His delightfully eccentric dual performance as Eddie Brock and the titular symbiote is the only reason to watch these movies. With a lesser actor in the role, theVenommovies would’ve crashed and burned. Hardy’s star power is the only thing they’ve got going for them.
There was a lot of hope forVenom: Let There Be Carnage, because it was directed by the great Andy Serkis, who knows a thing or two about bringing depth and humanity to CG characters, and promised tointroduce Venom’s most iconic nemesis from the comics, Carnage. But it was still a huge let-down. Sony is currently working onVenom 3for an October 2024 release. Hardy is once again co-writing the script with Kelly Marcel, who will make her directorial debut with the threequel, and such great actors as Chiwetel Ejiofor andTed Lasso’s Juno Temple have joined the cast in undisclosed roles. But after the disappointment of the first two films, there’s not much optimism surrounding the next one.
Morbius Was A Big Failure (Twice)
After the first twoVenommovies, Sony expanded into another standalone supervillain origin story withMorbius. With its tale of a vampiric antihero,Morbiuscould’ve been the nextBlade. But it was let down by the casting of the decidedly uncharismatic Jared Leto and a formulaic script following the same tired beats of a character acquiring superpowers, grappling with the responsibility, and becoming a hero. WhenMorbiuswas first released in theaters, just as everybody expected, it bombed at the box office. Then, a slog of ironic memes convinced Sony to re-release the movie in the hope of turning a profit, and it bombed a second time. It’s quite a feat for a movie to fail twice.
Kraven Looks Totally Generic
Sony’s latest Marvel-based offering,Kraven the Hunter, doesn’t look any better thanVenomorMorbius. In fact, it might be even worse, because it was misconceived from the get-go.Kraven the Hunterhighlights the problem with giving supervillains their own movie. In the comics, the thing that makes Kraven an interesting character is that he’s a big-game hunter who has determined that the greatest game is Spider-Man, and will do anything to hunt down and kill everyone’s favorite friendly neighborhood webslinger. He’sonly compelling in relation to Spider-Man. In Sony’s new movie, with no Spidey in sight, Kraven has been recharacterized as a generic antihero.
Sony’s Marvel movie franchise – known at different times as Sony’s Marvel Universe, Sony’s Universe of Marvel Characters, the Sony Pictures Universe of Marvel Characters, and Sony’s Spider-Man Universe (but, for some reason, never known simply as the Spider-Verse) – is a prime example ofwhy comic book movies are failing. The only reason to make aMorbiusmovie or aKraven the Huntermovie is because Sony owns the film rights to the property. There’s no story that needs to be told or character that viewers can identify with; the studio was looking for an easy cash grab and underestimated their audience’s taste.
It’s possible that Sony has a big surprise up its sleeve andKraven the Hunteris secretly the greatest movie ever made. But based on the trailer, that seems highly unlikely. From what the trailer has revealed, it looks like it’ll just be a typical big-budget thriller with some animal-themed action. After that, Sony’s next Marvel movie will beMadame Web.Sydney Sweeney’s A-list statusmight help to sell that one, but beyond that, it doesn’t look good. No one is asking for movies about El Muerto, Nightwatch, Jackpot, or Hypno-Hustler, and the long-in-development Sinister Six project will be pointless without Spider-Man.
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