I think it’s fair to say that a lot of people were shocked by Venom’s success last year. It’s a flawed film in more than a few ways, but it absolutely crushed the box office, pulling in $855 million worldwide. What shouldn’t be shocking is that Sony hopes to capitalize on the movie in every possible way, including forcing Tom Hardy’s take on the character into the MCU.
Though it should be taken with a grain of salt, industry insider Roger Wardell has revealed that Sony’s pushing Marvel Studios to include Venom in the Spider-Man: Far From Home follow-up. Comic book fans and film critics alike have praised Tom Holland’s portrayal of the web-head, so appearing in the next solo Spider-Man film could bring legitimacy to the alien anti-hero that it failed to earn in its own story.
Sony producer Avi Arad and Marvel chief Kevin Feige have had a long, tense history with each other, so a crossover always seemed unlikely. Yet, Sony has a larger sway in lending Spider-Man to the MCU, so who knows how rejecting the idea could affect Feige’s relationship with the company. Considering the hero’s importance to the future of the franchise, one would think that a proposition like this would put everyone at Marvel Studios in a bit of a bind.
In any case, the idea of the two Toms meeting isn’t new. Before its debut, rumors swirled that Holland would pop up somewhere in Venom, but that was eventually proven false. In fact, when Venom was originally announced, Sony chief Amy Pascal said the film would be an “adjunct” to the MCU, though Feige quickly shot that down in following interviews.
Whatever the status of this rumor, the studio’s main focus at the moment is promoting Spider-Man: Far From Home, which comes out July 2nd. Though plenty of surprising villains are expected to appear, Venom isn’t one of them. And that’s probably for the best, too, as as much as we’d like to forget, we all know what happened the last time he popped up in a Spider-Man sequel.