HallowScream - Venom (2018)

        Hey guys, Chuck here. Well, it's October once again, which means it's once again time for HallowScream. This year is going to be a little different from last year, as we'll be looking at a handful of Halloween favorites and horror movies new and old, but we'll be kicking this year's HallowScream off with my review of Venom. 

           The movie focuses on journalist Eddie Brock, whose gone from New York to San Francisco to further his career in journalism. However, after going too far with an interview with Carlton Drake, CEO of the Life Foundation, Eddie loses his job, and his fiancee Anne Weying breaks off their engagement. While this is going on, a Life Foundation probe carrying four alien symbiote specimens from space crashes in Malaysia, one symbiote escapes, and the rest are taken to San Francisco. 

        Six months pass, and Drake's experiments with the symbiotes are nearing completion, when a scientist who disagrees with Drake's irresponsible methods, Dr. Dora Skirth, turns to Eddie for help in exposing the truth. Skirth helps Eddie break into the facility and search for evidence, when he sees a friend of his, Maria is a test subject. Eddie tries to save her, but the symbiote she's carrying transfers itself to Eddie, and she dies as a result while Eddie gets away. The next day, Eddie begins exhibiting unusual behavior, including being overheated and extremely hungry. He turns to Anne for help, along with her new boyfriend Dr. Dan Lewis, and Dan discovers the symbiote inside of Eddie during an examination. Drake later infests Skirth with another symbiote, and both die, leaving Eddie's symbiote as the only viable specimen remaining. 

         Drake sends his men after Eddie, but Eddie and the symbiote, known as Venom, ultimately defeat them all, and the two ultimately agree to work together. While going after evidence against Drake, SWAT officers arrive, and Venom fights them off. Anne witnesses Eddie's transformation into Venom and takes him to Dan's hospital, where it's revealed that the Venom symbiote is slowly rotting Eddie's organs away. While Venom says the damage can be reversed, Anne uses the MRI machine to separate the two using the symbiotes' weakness of sonics to do so. Drake's men take Eddie away, and Anne reluctantly becomes a new host for Venom. 

          Drake, meanwhile, has become host for the fourth symbiote, Riot (who'd been body hopping on his journey to San Francisco), who Drake agrees to help use the Life Foundation probe to collect the rest the symbiotes and bring them to Earth to infest the entire planet. Eddie is taken to be killed, but Anne shows up as She-Venom, saves Eddie, and kisses him to transfer the Venom symbiote back to Eddie. Eddie and Venom, now teamed up again, decide to stop Drake and Riot. A fight ensues, the space probe launch is cancelled, and Drake and Riot are destroyed. A while later, Eddie and Anne seem to be back on good terms, and Eddie and Venom decide to use their skills to protect San Francisco from criminals, as a sort-of lethal protector. Some time after, Eddie is called into a mental institution, where he meets death row inmate and serial killer Cletus Kasady, who warns that once he gets out: "There's gonna be carnage." 

         Okay, much like Deadpool was the cinematic redemption that the Deadpool character needed after his abysmal treatment in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Venom is the same thing for the character of Venom after his piss-poor treatment in Spider-Man 3. Tom Hardy, who I've enjoyed since the first time I watched the movie Inception, was an excellent choice for Eddie Brock, and his duality/companionship with Venom is the funniest thing I've ever seen. Michelle Williams is definitely terrific as Anne, while the likes of Reid Scott as Dan, Melora Walters as Maria, and Jenny Slate as Dr. Skirth were all terrific. If there is one weak point, it would have to be Riz Ahmed as Carlton Drake/Riot. As a villain, Drake is kind of bland, and Riot doesn't make much of an impact as far as symbiotes go. 

          I definitely enjoyed the visual design for Venom here. It definitely looks and feels like the Venom from the comics, and while the character has no ties to Spider-Man, I'm totally okay with this new interpretation of the character. And let's be honest, fellas, getting to see She-Venom on screen is pretty damn awesome, even for a brief moment,  isn't it? 

         Other than that, great writing by Jeff Pinker, Scott Rosenberg, and Kelly Marcel and brilliant directing by Ruben Fleischer, whose work with the Zombieland movies I have thoroughly enjoyed, is what elevates this movie for me. I'm, therefore, giving Venom a rating of 5/5. Now, as I mentioned, the appearance of Cletus Kasady, played by Woody Harrelson, in a mid-credits scene for this movie was a set-up for a sequel: Venom: Let There Be Carnage. I'll be heading out to see the movie today, and I'll be giving you guys my review of the movie later on as part of HallowScream. That's today, and on top of that, I'll be posting my review of a Halloween favorite from the 90's, Hocus Pocus, next Tuesday. Don't go anywhere guys, because HallowScream is just getting started. 

      This is Chuck signing off, and I'll see you guys next time.