Turns Out Venom: Let There Be Carnage Nearly Included More Of Tom Holland’s Spider-Man
Despite going the franchise being known as Sony’s Spider-Man Universe, the film series focusing on Spider-Man-connected villains that launched in 2018 has yet to actually show Marvel’s Web-Slinger… well, with one small exception. In Venom: Let There Be Carnage’s mid-credits scene, Tom Hardy’s Eddie Brock and his symbiote partner were transported to the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and immediately they saw footage of Tom Holland’s Spider-Man on TV. Now director Andy Serkis has indicated we could have seen even more of Holland’s Spidey in the Venom sequel.
When Venom director Ruben Fleischer became too busy with Zombieland: Double Tap to work on Venom: Let There Be Carnage, Andy Serkis stepped in to helm the sequel. This was Serkis’ third time directing a movie, following 2017’s Breathe and 2018’s Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle, and he recalled to GQ how Let There Be Carnage’s mid-credits scene came to be, saying:
It was unsure as to the level of involvement that world would meet with our world… There were drafts which had more, a little more, of the other. The unspoken. It was very, very carefully chosen.
Although Spider-Man, his supporting cast and rogues gallery are Marvel characters, the film rights to this property are still held by Sony, which teamed with Marvel Studios in the mid-2010s to bring Tom Holland’s Peter Parker into the MCU. Outside of a brief separation in 2019, this Marvel/Sony collaboration has gone splendidly, but when it came to Venom: Let There Be Carnage, the studios, there was “a lot of coordination” between the two sides to figure out just the right amount of Spider-Man to feature. Granted, Andy Serkis didn’t outright mention Spider-Man, but it’s obvious that’s who he was talking about.
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Although it was unclear when Venom: Let There Be Carnage initially came out why Eddie Brock and the symbiote had been transported to the MCU, that matter was cleared up just two months later in Spider-Man: No Way Home, as they were among the characters from across the multiverse the who were affected by the corrupted spell Doctor Strange cast for Tom Holland’s Peter Parker. Andy Serkis didn’t elaborate on how much more we could have seen of Holland’s Spidey in these other Let There Be Carnage drafts, although the fact that he described it as “a little more” perhaps suggests that there would’ve only been more news footage of the Webbed Wonder, as opposed to Venom and Spider-Man crossing paths.
Ultimately Venom’s time in the MCU was short-lived. In Spider-Man: No Way Home’s mid-credits scene, just as Eddie Brock decided to seek out Spidey, he was transported back to his own universe. Although Venom 3 is on the way, we have no idea if Tom Hardy’s Venom and Tom Holland’s Spider-Man will ever meet, especially since a piece of the former’s symbiote was left behind in the MCU, meaning that franchise could get its own Venom someday. As for Andy Serkis, he’s not returning for Venom 3 because he’s busy with other projects, so writer Kelly Marcel will direct the threequel instead.
Tom Hardy announced a few days ago that Venom 3 has begun preproduction, but the project doesn’t have a release date yet. Meanwhile, Tom Holland’s fourth Spider-Man movie remains in development, with Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige saying earlier this month that the “writers are just putting pen to paper now.”