Despite the critical panning it received, Venom made a mountain of money at the box office, so a sequel featuring the symbiotic anti-hero seemed inevitable. Things have actually been surprisingly quiet on that front though since last October, but now we have it confirmed that Tom Hardy will definitely be back as Eddie Brock in Venom 2.
While speaking with Fandango, Sony producer Amy Pascal was asked about the future of the franchise. Naturally, she remained tight-lipped, but did promise that the English star is set to return.
“I can say that Tom Hardy will be back, magnificently playing that character as no one else can,”
This is obviously something we’d worked out ourselves, but it’s still nice to have it confirmed. Even those who didn’t enjoy the movie have to admit that Hardy was great in the dual role of Brock and his wisecracking parasite. In fact, Pascal went on to say how much of Venom‘s success is due to Hardy.
When asked to explain what connected with people about the film, she replied:
“It’s a couple of things. One of them is that Sony did a great job creating that franchise and giving it a life and giving it its own world. Then there’s Tom Hardy. When you think of Venom, you’ll never be able to think of anyone but Tom Hardy sitting in that bathtub of lobsters.”
In the same interview, Pascal also touched on the possibility of Tom Holland’s Spider-Man appearing in a future Venom movie, something the producer didn’t seem to rule out. In fact, she indicated that the studio has “big plans” for both the wall-crawler as a character and Holland specifically across the board.
Thanks to Venom‘s post-credits scene, we know Woody Harrelson’s Carnage will be the villain of the sequel. Sony may need to find a new director though as Ruben Fleischer isn’t expected to return. And while the follow-up is still lacking a release date, we imagine it’ll be here sooner rather than later.