What To Watch Before Venom: Let There Be Carnage

Film trailers are an act of escalation. At minimum, they exist to make the public aware of a project. At best, a trailer can turn a movie with buzz into something you must see, right now, no excuses. In the forever war for pop-culture dominance, trailers lead the movie studios' charge — which means they're often battling each other for supremacy. Getting the internet's attention, however, is a perilous task; it's hard to do, and when it backfires, it backfires big.

Which is why, on May 10th, 2021, "Venom: Let There Be Carnage" accomplished something amazing. Look, if a Gershwin-crooning parasite cooking breakfast badly doesn't escalate your interest in "Venom: Let There Be Carnage," then I don't know what to tell you. Andy Serkis' forthcoming film looks like a funnier and more menacing affair than the blockbuster that preceded it, functioning as rom-com horror alternative to the other comic book movies dropping this fall. Almost as importantly, its storyline draws from 30-plus years of comics canon, the filmographies of both Serkis and star Tom Hardy, and the heyday of '90's superhero films. That's makes it "must see" for me.

If you want to enrich your "Venom: Let There Be Carnage" experience (or aren't sure how to prepare for it), here are 10 films and television episodes to watch before you hit the theater.

Many casual filmgoers don't remember "Spider-Man 3." That's understandable. It's mostly been purged from collective memory by six subsequent Spider-Man movies, and reduced to a pretty great gag in "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse." Does it deserve re-appreciation? Depends on who you ask. But what's barely up for debate is that Tom Hardy's gonzo take on Venom doesn't make it to multiplexes if Topher Grace doesn't gun for mad-eyed and tragic menace as the character first. Like, really gun for it.

This isn't Grace's fault, just like it isn't Tom Brady's fault if he cannot dunk a basketball or hit a home run on cue. Grace was cast against type in a movie overcrowded with villains (the actor himself has practically said as much), but his inability to make Venom scary or sad was Sony's main argument for pivoting towards a funny, cool Venom 11 years later. To fully appreciate what "Venom" and "Venom: Let There Be Carnage" are doing with the character is to know "Spider-Man 3" backwards and forwards. Study up.

"Spider-Man Unlimited" is a strange show. Its animation is firmly from the '90s, but it might take place far in the future; it's never really clear. It also poaches Spidey's cape from the 2099 comics and give Peter Parker an accent (Queens, maybe — again, it's hard to tell). But even if "One Is the Loneliest Number" contains questionable aesthetics and dicey dialogue (at one point, Venom says to Spider Man, "We always thought of you as a swinger"), the episode perfectly captures the co-dependent bond between Venom and Edward Brock. The pair are more than attached. They're each other's enablers.

Venom exacerbates Brock's hatred and self-loathing. Brock, in turn, brings Venom human meals. It's a non-stop cycle of toxicity. And as anyone who's been in a bad relationship knows, leaving is easier said than done. In this instance, "One Is the Loneliest Number" posits that Brock has been bonded to a symbiote for so long that he'll die without it in his system. It's an all-too-human fear rendered using comic book tropes, and it's the exact fear that "Venom: Let There Be Carnage" looks to exploit to both hilarious and moving ends. What's more, "One Is The Loneliest Number" also features a surreal depiction of Carnage himself, which brings us straight to...

"Darkman" was a reaction to Tim Burton's "Batman" — literally. When the powers-that-be wouldn't let "Evil Dead" director Sam Raimi make a movie based on Batman or the Shadow, the director decided to adapt one of his '30's-set short stories for the screen instead. Universal was hoping it would be a cash cow; those hopes were dashed, fast. Their loss was cinema's gain, however, because "Darkman" is Raimi cutting the breaks on his own aesthetic in the hopes of going full dollar-store crime novel. He succeeds. If you've never seen the trailer, now's the time.

And, in retrospect, "Darkman" is more than ahead of its time — it's the blueprint for the blueprint, the film that paved the way for Joel Schumacher and his kaleidoscopic Batman films, and later for Raimi's own "Spider-Man." But the influence of its gothic pulp tendencies can also be seen in grungy cult efforts like "The Crow," "Spawn," and even "Blade." "Venom: Let There Be Carnage" is a close cousin of those movies, all of which are pulpy pictures full of dark asylums and radical monsters. "Darkman" is the real deal. Check it out imminently.

Though Marvel and Sony have both turned to indie directors as of late, "Venom: Let There Be Carnage" director Andy Serkis, who made his name playing mo-cap characters like Gollum and Planet of the Apes' Caesar, already has a known IP effort under his belt: the ambitious, motion-capture heavy "Mowgli: Legend of The Jungle." It's a sprawling picture, one that never clicks so much as revs through fits and starts. 

But besides revealing Serkis' taste for films with four-word subtitles, "Mowgli" suggests that Stephen Summers is Serkis' primary directorial influence. Like "The Jungle Book" director (we're talking about the 1994 live-action film, not the 2016 remake of the animated feature), Serkis stages deeply physical set-pieces (a battle in Sher Khan's cave is rife with live and CGI action, all of it visceral). He also pulls physically rich performances from on-set and mo-cap actors alike. Serkis is a sucker for physical comedy, too, finding time to put Mowgli through the slapstick ringer during a vine-swinging session.

Given all that, it's no wonder that Serkis was drawn to "Let There Be Carnage." The trailer alone suggests that motion capture, sudden violence, and a broad comic streak will be hallmarks of its story. A viewing of "Mowgli: Legend Of The Jungle" will help one better appreciate Serkis' efforts behind the camera.

One of the more surprising tidbits from the "Venom: Let There Be Carnage" press release is that star Tom Hardy is credited as a co-writer on the film. And while very few had "moviesStar co-writes gnarly comic book movie" on their vision board for 2021, "Let There Be Carnage" isn't the first project Hardy has helped pen. That title belongs to FX and BBC's "Taboo," which ran for one season and barely made any impact anywhere.

That doesn't, however, mean that "Taboo" isn't worth watching. In fact, quite the opposite — "Taboo" takes a straightforward revenge narrative and makes it labyrinthian, eschewing traditional storytelling for grim, ecstatic visuals and atmospheric world building. It also confirms Hardy's attraction characters whose heads wage war against their hearts. And given that the "Taboo" scripts also marry genre conventions to unexpected grace notes for flawed protagonists, it strongly hints at where "Venom: Let There Be Carnage" might be headed. Don't overlook this show.