Like the title suggests, there will be dancing in this third Venom film, but whether this is the last time Venom and his friend Eddie Brock will grace the cinematic screen is a question this film doesn’t provide a definitive answer.

Venom first appeared in the 2007 “Spider-Man 3” with Topher Grace as Eddie Brock Jr./Venom. Unfortunately, although it was intended to introduce a spin-off, a film from that version of Spider-Man (Tobey Maguire) and Grace’s Venom, never materialized. Peter Parker would go on to be played by Andrew Garfield in two films (“The Amazing Spider-Man” in 2012 and “The Amazing Spider-Man 2” in 2014) and by Tom Holland in three films (“Spider-Man: Homecoming” in 2017, “Spider-Man: Far from Home” in 2019 and “Spider-Man: No Way Home” in 2021).  Garfield and Maguire appear as different iterations of Spider-Man in the 2021 film. No such luck for Grace yet in the Sony Spider-Man Universe (SSU).

Spider-Man 3 (2007) ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Peter Parker, a promising physics student at Columbia University who freelances as a photographer for the “Daily Bugle,”  plans to propose to Mary Jane Watson. Watson, however, is making her debut on Broadway in a musical. She bombs and that negatively affects Parker’s plan to propose to her.

Nearby, a meteorite crashes down in Central Park, bringing an extraterrestrial symbiote entity that oozes about, sticking to Parker’s motorbike and eventually assimilating into Parker’s Spider-Man suit. At this point, Spider-Man has become a beloved hero.

Spider-Man battles his best friend Norman Osborn/New Goblin (James Franco), who believes Spider-Man killed his father and small-time thug Flinto Marko turned into a literal Sandman (Thomas Haden Church) as well as his own ego. Venom makes Peter less timid, but too arrogant and dangerously  violent. At the Bugle, Parker is competing with the unscrupulous Eddie Brock who helps J. Jonah Jameson (J.K. Simmons) prove Spider-Man is a criminal. However, Parker proves that Brock’s images are fake, and an enraged Jameson fires Brock.

Parker is able to remove Venom from his Spider-Man suit, but Brock becomes Venom’s new host. Brock as Venom joins forces with Sandman to kill Spider-Man/Peter Parker. In the end, Brock/Venom kills Harry/New Goblin and Brock and Venom are supposedly vaporized.

“Spider-Man 3” received a 63% rating on the Tomatometer.

Venom (2018) ⭐️⭐️

In 2018, a year after Holland had taken over Spider-Man, Sony released “Venom” to mostly negative reviews from critics, but there was praise for Tom Hardy’s performance as the dual personalities of Eddie and Venom.

In “Spider-Man 3,” Venom and his Eddie Brock (Topher Grace), were the villains, but in Venom, the villain is a corporation–Life Foundation,  and its CEO, Carlton Drake (Riz Ahmed). Eddie Brock/Venom (Tom Hardy) has left New York due to a scandal caused by his behavior and is starting over at a news agency where he files “The Eddie Brock Report” and living with his girlfriend, Anne Weying (Michelle Williams),  He’s assigned by Jack (Ron Cephas Jones) to do a piece on Carlton Drake. Jack wants Brock to be nice, but Brock is an investigative journalist here (whereas in “Spider-Man 3” he was a photographer).

Earlier,  Life Foundation had sent a probe into outer space and one has found symbiotic lifeforms but  while bringing back four samples, the ship crashed in Malaysia. That should mean some Southeast Asian-looking actor would have a prominent role, but, of course, that’s not going to happen. Instead, southeast Asian and East Asian actors become background players as the one escaped symbiotic lifeform, Riot, is slowly tracked in its journey from Malaysia to San Francisco. The Life Foundation has been using those months to take the symbiotic lifeforms and allow them to possess homeless people.

Using info obtained unscrupulously from his live-in corporate lawyer girlfriend’s laptop, he learns about Life Foundation doing trials on homeless people. He wants to expose these unethical practices of Life Foundation, but using the info he has, be plays hardball instead of playing nice. Jack fires Eddie, but Eddie’s actions also gets his girlfriend, Anne Weying, fired from her legal firm. Weying breaks up with Eddie.

Six months later, one of the Life Foundation’s researchers, Dora Skirth (Jenny Slate) reaches out to Brock. One of the homeless people Brock was acquainted with, Maria (Melora Walters), is in the lab and when Brock attempts to save her, Venom transfers to her. Brock is forced to turn to Anne and her new boyfriend, Dr. Dan Lewis (Reid Scott) for help.

This becomes a battle between Venom/Eddie and Riot/Carlton. And while Anne  believes Eddie Brock and Venom as separated at the film’s end, they remain bonded.

Directed by Ruben Fleischer (“Zombieland,” 2009) with a screenplay written by Jeff Pinkner (“The Amazing Spider-Man 2” with Roberto Orcie and Alex Kurtzman), Scott Rosenberg (“Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle”) and Kelly Marcel (“Mad Max: Fury Road”), the film is chaotic and it’s unfortunate that Southeast Asia is used as a background and there are no prominent people who look Southeast or East Asian in the cast despite being set in San Francisco.  Michelle Lee does play the Malaysian EMT who is the first earthly host for Venom. Peggy Lu, who has a small role in the film as a convenience store owner who Eddie Brock helps, and her role is expanded in the sequel “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” and again, in “Venom: The Last Dance,” so this minor quibble is rectified later in the series.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage ⭐️⭐️

The film starts in the St. Estes Reform School (California 1996) with a love story between Cletus Kasady (Jack Bandeira as the young version) and the girl he calls his angel. In the mid-credits clip from the 2018 film, Cletus (Woody Harrelson) is a serial killer that Eddie was invited to interview in prison. He promised “carnage’ should he escape and “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” brings this promise into being.

His love, Frances Barrison, is taken to Ravencroft Institute, which is, in the Marvel Comics, a high security prison for the criminally insane. Frances has mutant powers–a sonic scream, which she uses during her transfer. That injures the young police officer Patrick Mulligan’s ears, but she shoots her. Although Mulligan believes he killed Frances, she is alive.

In the present-day, Mulligan has become a detective and he asks journalist Eddie Brock to visit Cletus in San Quentin State Prison. Cletus will only talk to Brock. At this time, Eddie Brock and Venom are like two warring roommates. Venom reminds Eddie that he is a predator and craves the brains of humans or chocolate (provided by store owner, Mrs. Chen (Lu), but often has to be satisfied with chicken.

“We are wasting our talents,” Venom exclaims.

Venom finds a woman who who is fighting a purse-snatcher and almost eats that guy’s head, but Eddie argues against it. After letting the guy live, Eddie admonishes Venom, “She didn’t want our help.”

“She didn’t know she needed our help, Eddie. There is a difference,” Venom counters.

Venom is still bonded with Brock when he visits Cletus. Brock hopes to discover where Cletus has buried the bodies of his many victims, but instead, Cletus attacks Brock and Venom attacks Cletus. This leads to a big argument back at Brock’s apartment and Venom leaves Brock.

Yet, during the attack, Cletus bit Eddie Brock’s hand and ingested some of the symbiote. That symbiote prevents the lethal injection during Cletus’ execution. The symbiote, Carnage, breaks out of the prison after freeing other inmates and killing the guards. Carnage helps Cletus find Frances and while Carnage wants to destroy Brock and Venom, he also helps Cletus arrange a wedding with Frances at Grace Cathedral.

To save Eddie Brock, who has been arrested by a suspicious Mulligan, Anne searches for Venom who is body-hopping. Venom and Eddie Brock face off Cletus and Venom and, as there is a sequel, you know that Venom and Eddie Brock win. Venom and Eddie Brock, however, are now fugitives.

Woody Harrelson makes a great villain and the depiction of his life is made into a disturbing animated sequence.  Directed by Andy Serkis with a screenplay by Kelly Marcel (story credited to Tom Hardy and Marcel), the film focuses on the growing friendship between Brock and Venom and Hardy’s performance is allowed to expand. The explanation of Cletus serial killer and Frances’ love isn’t convincing. Consider that I watch documentary after documentary and a variety of TV series about serial killers. The story just underwhelms.

Venom: The Last Dance (2024) ⭐️⭐️⭐️

To be honest, I wasn’t that interested in Venom until a chance encounter at LA Comic-Con sent my social media presence into orbit. At this point, Eddie Brock and Venom are fugitives and hiding in Mexico.

Two separate backstories collide here and eventually meet up with Eddie Brock/Venom.

Once upon a time something created the symbiotes, but they turned against their creator, Knull (Andy Serkis). Knull is imprisoned even though he is the “god of the Void” and the only thing that can free him is a codex. What is a codex? According to Merriam-Webster, “a manuscript book especially of Scripture, classics or ancient annals.” That’s not what a codex is here. When I searched “Venom codex” on 23 October 2024, I got VeNom Coding group. That’s something for veterinary academics and practitioners in the UK. In this case, the codex is within Venom, and Knull sends out some frightening creatures to track it down yet these creatures can only find its signal when Venom is full exposed in his form.

In a flashback, we see Dr. Teddy Payne (Juno Temple) as a young girl when she was warned by her brother about lightning. “When thunder roars, head indoors.” They run to safety, but don’t make it. Payne is struck by lightning. She survives but one of her arms is paralyzed. Her brother dies. She fulfills her brother’s dreams and becomes a scientist working for the government at the fabled Area 51.

What the public can see of Area 51 has become a tourist attraction for people interested in aliens. That is being closed down (“decommissioned,” according to Strickland), but what the public cannot see exists deep underground where now the symbiotes are being examined by government scientists, Payne being one of the lead researchers at the Imperium Program for Symbiote Analysis.

Eddie Brock/Venom decide to head back to the US with New York City being their goal. First Venom needs some food. He’s determined to “eat every bad guy that gets in our way” because he tells Brock, “I need fuel for the road.” They hear some dogs and, don’t worry. Venom doesn’t eat the dogs, but the guys keeping the dogs for dog fights become his fuel. Brock complains that he’s stuck with a superhero who can’t fly, but Venom does get them on a flight. You might have visions of the Richard Matheson short story, “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” which was also an episode of the original “The Twilight Zone” (episode 3 for Season 5) with William Shatner and later remade in 1983 for “Twilight Zone: The Movie” with John Lithgow. (See CJ Arellano’s analysis below).

It’s there that one of the tracking creatures finds Venom. Their subsequent fight leaves Eddie Brock in the Southwestern desert of the US. Hopping from animal to animal until Brock and Venom are separated when the US military led by Rex Strickland (Chiwetel Ejiofor)  find them.

Brock/Venom will eventually hitch a ride with some hippies. The father, Martin (Rhys Ifans), is an alien and UFO enthusiast who wants to see Area 51 before it is nothing but dust. He and his wife, Nova Moon (Alanna Ubach) and their kids, the cheery son (Dash McCloud) and the skeptical daughter (Hala Finley) are traveling in a VW van. They do reach Area 51 and, unwisely, enter the grounds via an opening in the chainlink fence.

This film reminds us that “We all have monsters inside of us.” With any road trip film, it is all about the journey and there are some fabulous sequences. The animal hopping sequence is my favorite because I love to see the artistic interpretations of other animals becoming Venomized, while my husband liked the sequence where Brock and Venom are in the car and become a single rocket man. As advertised there is a dance which features Mrs. Chen.

In her first feature film as director, Kelly Marcel incorporates music and sound design into the film much more than in the previous two films to provide moments that are fun and funny. Sometimes there’s a wit to the song choices. Her brief bio in IMDb.com notes that she “started her career in musical theater with the UK version of ‘Debbie Does Dallas, the Musical.'” Marcel also wrote the screenplay with a story by Tom Hardy. This film has the most character development and yet has the required explosive battle scenes you’ve come to expect from the Venom films.

My favorite Venom cosplayer, Luis_Spiderknight (Instagram and TikTok), rates “Venom” as 4.5 stars, “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” as a 4-star and “Venom: The Last Dance” as a solid five.

Do be sure to stay in your seats (and off your cellphones) for the mid-credits and post-credits scenes.

“Venom: The Last Dance” premiered in New York City on 21 October 2024 and will be released on 25 October 2024 in the US.