Kraven the Hunter has started rolling out into theaters and, well, it's going to be an interesting weekend for what could end up being Sony's final villain-led movie in a franchise that kinda, sorta launched with 2018's Venom.
Like Madame Web before it, Kraven the Hunter is treated as a "standalone" story so there's no sign of Morbius or The Vulture to see if he fancies joining their team to "do some good." The movie still sets up a sequel, though.
During the final act, crimelord Aleksei Sytsevich and The Foreigner team up to take Kraven down. They've abducted his beloved brother, Dmitri, leaving Kraven and Calypso to gear up for a battle where the odds definitely aren't in their favour.
Kraven lays waste to Sytsevich's goons but is stopped in his tracks by The Foreigner's hypnotic powers; the Hunter imagines he's being surrounded by, ahem, spiders, but is saved when Calypso brutally kills the villain with an arrow to the head.
As Kraven closes in on Sytsevich, the gangster reveals that a New York doctor called Miles Warren - better known to comic book fans as The Jackal - has helped him become a mutant Rhino-man, and he proceeds to transform into the somewhat comic-accurate baddie. After a violent battle, Kraven kills Rhino and concludes that his father, Nikolai, was behind the assassination attempt.
Following a confrontation, he allows a bear to maul his dear old dad to death (the insinuation is that Kraven told the bear to do it because he can influence animals with his mind). He then learns that Dmitri has chosen to take over their father's empire and become The Chameleon. That's courtesy of Dr. Miles Warren as well, and he can now transform into anyone he likes because The Jackal is presumably just handing out superpowers to whoever asks because that's easier than figuring out origin stories.
In Kraven the Hunter's final scene, the title character dons his classic vest from the comics and looks set to continue his vigilante ways by setting out to take down his brother for becoming like the gangsters he's spent the whole movie hunting and killing.
The stage is set for a sequel pitting Kraven against Chameleon, though a follow-up is unlikely to happen. As noted, it appears the plan was for Warren to create animalistic foes for the anti-hero to face, meaning we've likely been saved from seeing a mutant Scorpion and Doctor Octopus.
Blissfully, nothing in the movie's closing moments suggests he'll battle Spider-Man and it's unclear how or why filmmaker J.C. Chandor thought this story would lead to Kraven's Last Hunt.
Kraven the Hunter arrives in theaters on December 13.