Was Sony putting too tight of constraints on Venom? The film’s director reveals how the project changed and if there was any chance for him to meet Spider-Man.
Over the last decade, Sony has engaged in one of the oddest attempts at building a tentpole blockbuster franchise in cinema history. That being, to make a series of films focused on Spider-Man villains without the iconic web-head being seen or even mentioned. And out of the six films produced in this vein, only the three Venom projects managed to come out relatively unscathed.
However, just because the Venom films were passable doesn’t mean they were any easier to make. Ruben Fleischer, who served as director on the first film in the trilogy, recently spoke to The Playlist about working with Sony on the film. He revealed that the character was never meant to cross paths with Spider-Man, which presented some unique hurdles.
“That was the first real Spider-Man-affiliated movie. We were all trying to figure out exactly what that wants to be.’Venom was always defined by Spider-Man – our movie couldn’t feature Spider-Man. So it created an interesting challenge.”
“From my memory of it, granted it was a while ago, but from my memory of it, it was always distinct from Spider-Man. Maybe there was the possibility of them crossing paths down the road, but inherent to ours was that it couldn’t be defined by that.”
How Venom Changed For Sony’s Restrictions
One of the biggest defining features of Venom is the Spider-Man emblem strewn across his chest. Continuing on, Ruben Fleischer revealed that part of the puzzle in cracking a Venom film was designing a brand new logo for the character and a reason for it to be on his chest. This, of course, being an inherent affect of Sony’s restrictions for the team.
“It’s funny because in the comics, Venom has a spider on his chest, and that’s because he derives from Spider-Man. We had to come up with a whole new origin story and actually create a different pattern on his chest, unique for the film, because it wouldn’t have made sense if he had a spider on his chest if he had no affiliation with Spider-Man.”
In the end, Sony’s Spider-Man universe without Spider-Man will go down as a failed experiment. The movies, including the entire Venom trilogy, will be a monument of the lost goldrush of superhero films. And for as big of a challenge it was for the director and crew that worked on it, hopefully there will at least be some who find enjoyment in the projects in the years to come.
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