I slept on Venom: The Last Dance way too long. It went from my planning to see it in the theater last year to completely forgetting about it. A couple of nights ago, after my wife and daughter finished a couple of episodes of Traitors, we all sat there and no one would give a suggestion on what to watch next. Then out of protest, I decided to flip on Venom: The Last Dance. I figured this would clear the room and I'd have the TV all to myself so I could watch whatever I wanted. Instead, after a couple of minutes my daughter put down her iPad and joined me in the delight that is Venom!
I think one of the reasons I waited so long is that I had really enjoyed the first Venom but did not love Venom: Let There Be Carnage as much. But after seeing the latest installment, it has inspired me to circle back and watch the second one again.
Although the Sony made Venom movies are still not as good as most of the Marvel Studios movies, they are not that far off. In fact, venom is actually better than a few of the lesser Marvel movies like The Eternals.
Like the previous installments, the best thing about Venom: The Last Dance is the relationship between Eddie Brock and Venom... the parasitic symbiote that lives inside of him. Venom is handled very similarly to how Marvel portrayed The Hulk. While both of them could have been incredibly scary monsters, the writers decided to lean into the comedy angle a bit more to make sure everyone could enjoy these characters. While the Hulk just wants to smash "big monster", Venom would love to eat every person he sees. As son as Eddie and Venom make a pact to only eat evil doers, the series becomes incredible fun. That continues in the final (maybe) installment in the trilogy.
In this story, Eddie and Venom need to save earth by battling big crazy dog like kaiju monsters that come from Venom's home planet. The McGuffin in this movie is Eddie and Venom himself. Apparently when Eddie died in an earlier movie and then Venom brought him back to life it created a codex inside them that was the key to freeing some terrible alien overlord. I am exhausted just typing that. My brain hurts. But I swear, you don't have to understand that or even care about the ultimate plot to enjoy this movie. Just sit back and watch the giant world destroying dog-things try to kill Eddie and Venom... and more importantly Eddie and venom find ways to survive.
The movie is just flat out fun. The banter between Eddie and Venom is as funny as ever. And the action is sensational. Although the special effects are no where near as good as Marvel Studios, the technology has come so far so even 2nd tier special effects are still incredible. And this movie is filled with reasons to flex their special effects muscles.
I'd say that 90% of the time, there was either action or Eddie and Venom were doing something funny. I was never bored for one second (neither was my daughter). And I hate to spoil this... but honestly nothing can spoil it... so if you are not convinced you need to watch this action and laugh packed movie yet, then let me sweeten the deal.
If you watch Venom: The Last Dance, you will get to see Venom in a full on ballroom dance number with Mrs. Chen. It is as if Venom had chosen Fred Astaire as his host. If you don't know who Fred Astaire is, go ask your grandma. I'm sure she will know.