Despite all its posturing and attempts to seem badass and hardcore, just like Suicide Squad before it, it seems that Venom has fallen into the trap of wanting to be part of a larger cinematic universe and is going to be rated PG-13 instead of R. Which means all the biting scenes and intense impaling will most likely be toned down until the eventual Blu-ray cut of the film.
(image: 20th Century Fox)
Polygon reported that this rating is now officially reflected on Sony’s official page, a month before the movie is slated to appear the theaters. Erik Davis, the managing editor at Fandango, is speculating that this is because the studio might want Venom and Spider-Man to eventually face off and a PG-13 rating makes that more possible than an R rating. Which sure, that would make sense if Deadpool and Logan didn’t exist.
#Venom is officially rated PG-13. Hearing from studio sources the reason is so that Venom and Spider-Man can face off at some point down the line. If the movie is R, it’s hard to do that. pic.twitter.com/dBZzgY18k3
— Erik Davis (@ErikDavis) September 13, 2018
As someone who was already underwhelmed by the whole Venom thing, every time I see a trailer for the film I can’t believe that someone let Tom Hardy walk out with that accent. Yet, for the promise of some R-rated human eating, I would gladly use my AMC pass to go see Venom. Now, I’ll still go see it with my AMC pass, but I know that this movie is going to be more “turd in the wind” than people eating.
The fear of not being able to cross over the Venom and Spider-Man universes makes little sense to me. I’m sure people would expect the tone for Venom as a character to shift as he is moved into the more “family-friendly” MCU proper. Plus, after Spider-Man 3, people would just be happier to see Venom done right than worrying if he will be restrained by a PG-13 movie. He’s a comic book character, he’s lived in a PG-13 world before, and he could go back to that again if he met up with Spidey.
Let’s make our movie worse in case the most successful franchise in history decides to completely upend what they do at some unpredictable point in the future so that some our movie’s sequels might do better (should they occur) #SonysUniverseofMarvelCharacters https://t.co/sKlqvCtLPT
— Matthew Ball (@ballmatthew) September 14, 2018
“If the movie is R, it’s hard to do that.”
Not really.
Not at all in fact.
Comics crossover all the time. Ones with wildly different tones. https://t.co/YWNEzCm316
— Dantooine (@Danburden1138) September 14, 2018
You can’t just say that they’ll face off at “some point”. You’re not planning ahead at this point, you’re just making implications that it “might” happen when what we want is for it to REALLY happen, but we already know that it won’t and reintroducing Spiderman is a bad decision. https://t.co/1fT1USMHAh
— 🎸Ray Iñaki 🎸 (@BinoculasaurRex) September 14, 2018
I want some of whatever @SonyPictures is smoking. @VenomMovie‘s entire marketing campaign has been based off a PARASITE THAT EATS PEOPLE and suddenly they’re gonna make it PG-13? Pfffffffft. Garbage. Guaranteed Venom is ass & they want PG-13 money opening weekend before it tanks. https://t.co/w9VFcf3zDW
— Epic Film Guys (@EpicFilmGuys) September 14, 2018
Makes sense, but man, it really makes you wonder what they could’ve done by going all-out with an R-rating — especially with this character. Here’s hoping it’s good, anyway, of course. But if any character screams for an R-rated movie, it’s this one. https://t.co/x70vke9UYu
— Trent Moore (@trentlmoore) September 13, 2018
If we are going to do a stand-alone movie with villains who kill, let them kill, let them be bad. LET THE BODIES HIT THE FLOOR!
*Ahem*
Plus, a wide audience of people will see this movie regardless of if it is PG-13 or R, comic book movies have proven to be able to excel at the box office with being R-rated. The only reason not to do it, as far as I’m concerned, is because they are looking for some more of that sweet joint-Marvel money and if the movie is bad, they want as many youths to see it as possible to make up for it not being good enough.
Well, Oct 5th isn’t too far away; we will see how badly the turd smells. At least the cast is hot.
(via Polygon, image: Sony)
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