Venom: The Last Dance is the "most cinematic, monumental Venom movie yet" and, earlier this week, we sat down with writer and director Kelly Marcel to learn more about the threequel.
Marcel also wrote Venom and Venom: Let There Be Carnage, but steps behind the camera to helm her first feature with this instalment. As well as explaining why she wanted to shoot on location as much as possible, the filmmaker discusses how she deepened the bond between Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy) and Venom.
Marcel also reveals whether Spider-Man was ever considered for this trilogy, the decision to make the Xenophage Venom: The Last Dance's primary threat, and confirms that the monsters are meant to be the female siblings of Symbiotes.
Finally, we learn why (and when) Andy Serkis was cast as Knull, God of the Symbiotes, a villain expected to be a major threat to the Marvel Universe moving forward.
You can check out the full interview with Marcel on the Venom threequel in the player below.
This is the biggest, most cinematic Venom movie yet - coming on board this one as director, what were your main goals to make sure this trilogy concluded in the most epic way possible?
I wanted to get out of San Francisco, get out of darkness and nighttime and bring Eddie and Venom out into these epic landscapes and into the daylight and shoot everything as practically as possible. The rapid sequence is all practical. That is a bunch of people, including Tom Hardy, underwater in a tank for two weeks. He’s really on that motorbike, we’re really exploding things in that third act outside and while we used little green screen elements here and there, most of the movie is shot practically which is something I’m really, really proud of.
Part of what makes it such a huge movie for fans is the introduction of Knull. Why was Andy Serkis the right person to play the villain and what sort of work did you both do to figure out what he’d sound like?
So Knull actually was the first character we went in to design for this movie. Before Venom-Horse...Xenophage and Knull were the first two [characters] that went into the works in terms of design. We knew we had to get Knull right. He's a massive, massive fan favourite. We wanted to stick as close to the comics as possible in terms of what he looked like. We knew Andy Serkis would be Knull from Venom 2. He was our director on Venom 2; Tom and I were always talking on Venom 2 about what Venom 3 was going to be and we knew we wanted to introduce Knull in the way that we have. At the same time, looking at Andy Serkis every day as he's directing, [we're saying] 'Well, he's the greatest. Knull is CGI mo-cap and a lot of voice acting and there's only one person for that. He's the greatest. We always knew it would be Andy. We love Andy and it felt right. We've brought most of our team along with us for all three of these movies so we really want to keep it as a family. Andy is a massive part of the Venom family.
Tom Hardy is asked a lot about facing Spider-Man and seems keen to make it happen; over the course of this trilogy, did you ever explore the possibility of including any version of Peter Parker?
We’d love to see Venom fight Spider-Man but it’s kind of not our decision, you know? I think Tom’s been really, really up for it and it’s certainly something I would love to see. With Venom, we were given a remit and the remit was three movies about Venom and Eddie. That’s what we did. If there was anything in the future, I’m as big a fan as anyone else. I’d love to see them go up against each other.
For many fans, Carnage is the ultimate Venom villain but the Xenophage up the ante as these Terminator-like, unstoppable monsters - how did you come to choose them as Knull’s army rather than some other possibilities from the comics?
Well, Knull created the Xenophage and he also created the Symbiotes. I kind of loved the idea that the thing that was hunting Venom and Eddie is Venom’s sister. I think the Xenophage is a she. We referred to her as Elaine during the shooting. I just loved the idea of them and then as Tom and I were discussing the character of the Xenophage, we came up with the idea that they had these woodchipper mouths and whatever they ate spat out the back of some vent in her head. As soon as we came up with that, we just thought that would be the most fun thing to see on screen and that she would be an awesome thing to fight for them.
Eddie and Venom’s relationship in this film was a highlight for me because it feels like they’re less at odds and more bonded than ever; what did you enjoy most about exploring their closeness in this film?
I think in Venom 1, they did not want to be together but were forced together. In Venom 2, they’ve been together for a while and don’t like each other so split up. In Venom 3, they’ve kind of come to the conclusion that they love each other and want to be together. They’ve reached symbiosis with each other, but of course, that’s the very thing that’s going to tear the world apart. I loved that they reached symbiosis but we all know Venom and Eddie bickering with each other is something we all love so I definitely wanted to bring some of that back into it and I love the fact Venom is completely dishonest. There’s always something else he hasn’t told Eddie. There’s always another shoe that’s dropping so that’s the thing I love exploring between the two of them. This sudden, ‘Oh, there’s another thing’ and Eddie just like ‘Oh!’ all the time.
Venom: The Last Dance is now playing exclusively in cinemas.