Despite negative reviews, Venom was a hit in 2018. Grossing $856 million at the worldwide box office on a reported $116 million production budget, the movie's success continued when it hit physical media (it's said to have earned $70.7 million in DVD and Blu-ray sales).
Venom: Let There Be Carnage and Venom: The Last Dance weren't quite as successful - earning $501.5 million and $474.5 million, respectively - but Sony Pictures has still made a lot of money from the Lethal Protector.
Todd McFarlane and David Michelinie co-created the iconic villain who has little in common with Tom Hardy's interpretation of Eddie Brock. Talking to CBR, McFarlane shared his thoughts on how Venom has been translated to screen and his evolution from bad guy to anti-hero.
"Well, I didn't have, I didn't have any input into any other and again, it doesn't bug me, right? Like I understand what the rules are. So they did their movie. They were successful, right?" he started. "Tom Hardy, you know, sort of did a cool thing. I got to meet him for the first time, you know, about a month ago or something."
"And super cool, if you're, if you're asking the basic question, would I have written and directed exactly like they did, of course not, right?"
The comic book creator continued, "I would like but look at as the guy who co-created Venom, and especially the look of them to me, Venom's not a good guy, like in my brain, like they turned Venom into kind of a good guy after I left, Marvel, right? So in my mind, he was a he was a villain, and then he was a villain, and then I left."
"And so it was, it was when I had my back turned that all of a sudden, I was like, What do you talk about? Venom's a good guy. And so I think my tendencies are always to go sort of dark and serious," McFarlane added.
So, like most fans, there's a lot he would change about the Venom franchise. Chief among them would be taking the Spider-Man villain down a darker, far more adult route.
"I would have Venom. Would have been an R rated movie if they had said, 'Todd, putting you in charge.' But nobody asked. So that's okay. Yeah, they try to make them very relatable," McFarlane explained. "Again, again. Everybody has a business and they're trying to do the best they can their businesses, and they want to have as broad an audience as possible, right?"
Hardy bid farewell to the Venom franchise with The Last Dance and rumours he'll clash with Spider-Man in the web-slinger's next MCU movie appear to have been incorrect.
While there were rumblings about a Venom 4 revolving around Flash Thompson/Agent Venom, that appears to have been sidelined - along with the rest of Sony's Marvel movies - in the wake of Kraven the Hunter bombing at the box office. Sony is bound to revisit Venom eventually, though.
What would you change about the Venom franchise?