“Venom: The Last Dance” Has Two Left Feet

Sony’s most successful Spiderman spin-off character, Venom, is back for the conclusion(?) of their trilogy in “Venom: The Last Dance.”  The first two chapters were silly and chaotic but worked as fun, escapism entertainment.  Can “The Last Dance” recreate the messy magic, or will this finale fall flat?

The movie opens with something I’ve never seen before.  One of the post-credit scenes from “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” showed the duo being transported to the MCU universe, teasing a showdown between Spiderman & Venom.  This was quickly kyboshed with the post-credit scene from “Spider-Man: No Way Home” where Eddie (Tom Hardy) and Venom are sucked back into their original universe by Doctor Strange’s magic.  It’s revealed that Venom left a small bit of himself behind, just before being transported.  This scene is has been reshot and now serves as the intro to the movie.  Instead of Strange returning them, it appears they are somehow transported through a portal created by the villainous god of darkness, Knull (Andy Serkis).  Venom also doesn’t shed his viral spawn until his return, apparently eliminating any chance of him showing up in the MCU.

Back in their own universe, the FBI are searching for Eddie since he’s been implicated in the death of Detective Mulligan (Stephen Graham) during the cathedral battle with Carnage.  In a drunken stupor Brock/Venom decide their best course is to leave Mexico, head to NYC, and try to blackmail some unnamed judge.  They don’t make it far before learning two more entities are on their trail.  Knull has sent out insectoid hunters across the galaxy searching for a “codex” to free himself.  As luck would have it, this codex appears whenever Brock/Venom turns into full Venom mode.  In addition, a secret branch of the military, led by Rex Strickland (Chiwetel Ejiofor) and Dr. Payne (Juno Temple) is tracking down any symbiotes they can find.    Strickland and Payne already have an assortment of symbiotes they are studying underground at the soon-to-be decommissioned Area 51.

This has all the earmarks of a potentially great, zany, buddy road-trip film.  Instead, it spends half the movie with Eddie alone in the desert, a short (weird) stint in Las Vegas, and the last half in Area 51.  Tom Hardy is the heart and soul of all these movies.  The first two worked best when he was experiencing insanity while living in a relatively normal world.  His interactions with all the other humans is where a large chunk of the fun was.  Unfortunately, in “The Last Dance,” his best moments are monologues with Venom, but that quickly becomes tiresome.

I don’t expect much logic from superhero films, especially those from Sony.  But they need to have some set of rules or basic driving motivations for their characters.  Everything in this movie feels so paper thin, that it’s just one scene, then another, then another.  Matt Stone and Trey Parker distinguish good storytelling from bad by what connects the scenes. According to them, good stories connect each scene with “therefore.”  Lazy storytelling connects them with “and then.”  “The Last Dance” is definitely an “and then” type story, and not even the charismatic Lethal Protector(s) can rescue it.

Note:  Fans of the comic series may love some of the character cameos, but without any context these appearances are gratuitous and meaningless.