The Definitive Guide to Living in the Capital , Cairo , Egypt

You walk into your grandmother’s house and you are starving, but you’re told to wait for lunch. So, you sneak into your grandmother’s room, climb on top of the bed and reach over on top of the dresser where you find a hidden box of cookies. Your eyes glimmer, your mouth salivates, you open it, only to find a sewing kit. There was so much potential, there were so many good things going for it, but in the end, Venom disappoints just as much as a sewing-kit-filled cookie box.

Venom follows Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy), once a successful journalist and a happily engaged man, now a jobless and lonely man, all because he investigated The Life Foundation. Led by evil scientist Carlton Drake (Riz Ahmed), The Life Foundation explored space, retrieved aliens, and is ruthlessly and continuously testing whether or not these creatures can, physically and literally, bond to human hosts. When one of these creatures (Venom chooses Eddie as its host, Eddie has to tame its viciousness and convince it to help him stop the other creatures from destroying Earth.

Right on the edge of elaborate and clunky? You are probably right.

The film’s plot isn’t the smoothest which made for several bumps along the road. For example, Venom tells Eddie that he changed his mind, wants to stay, and will help him save the planet. The problem is we don’t see how this happened, what Eddie did to convince him, or any signs of a growing bond before that point.

Another bump is the other aliens, who seem to be in the background for the film’s entirety, until the very end when one of them suddenly – and without much context- rises up as the leader. Many fans were also very disappointed to see that Spiderman did not appear in the feature.

There were positive aspects to the film, including its light dabble with comedy on several occasions, especially in the banter between Eddie and Venom. The instances are not many and that is such a disappointment because the audience could see the comedic and sarcastic potential with an actor like Tom Hardy and the character of Venom. The end result of this refusal to embrace the comedy is the audience getting a glimpse of what could have been a blast, but getting seriously upset and disappointed.

As for the acting, Tom Hardy was phenomenally able to give his character personal traits and a unique persona in the middle of the messy, action stuffed film. Hardy’s facial expressions, body language, sarcastic humour, and rugged good looks were all on point and, if it wasn’t for him, Venom would have got much worse reviews. Playing his ex-fiancé, Michelle Williams was mediocre with a stiff performance and almost no chemistry with Tom Hardy; this is such a shame since the two are extremely talented. Riz Ahmed also managed to convey the evil scientist persona of his character, but fell short when it came to facial expressions. This left his performance somewhat flat.

Watch Venom to fulfil your curiosity and to witness the talent and allure of Tom Hardy, but try to not think of what could have been, because it all goes downhill from there.