As long as Sony has had the rights to Spider-Man, the company has been trying to figure out how to turn one character into a vast shared universe. The solo Venom movie appears to be the linchpin these plans rest on, but who will Venom fight? The one Spidey villain worse than he is, it turns out.
The Hollywood Reporter has a long story about how Sony’s deal to share Spider-Man with Marvel Studios will work that also details the other planned movies in the franchise. Amid that is the telling sentence, “As for the expansion plans, Tom Hardy is starring in Venom, dated for Oct. 5, 2018, which will also feature the villain Carnage.”
If you’re not familiar, Carnage is a serial killer bonded with the “son” of Venom’s living suit, which is actually an alien symbiote. Basically, if Venom is a psychopath, Carnage is a homicidal maniac. He’s also a somewhat controversial villain among fans, especially as he was introduced in a grim arc that had him murdering people at random. It is odd, however, in that Carnage came along well after Venom was an established villain, so the movie is likely changing Carnage’s origin. It also more or less tells us that an R-rating is all but inevitable; Carnage, before he was a supervillain, was basically the kid from The Bad Seed writ large. We’ll find out soon enough.
(via The Hollywood Reporter)