October 23, 2024
by Carla Hay

Directed by Kelly Marcel
Culture Representation: Taking place in California, Nevada and briefly in New York City, the sci-fi/action film “Venom: The Last Dance” (based on Marvel Comics characters) features a predominantly white cast of characters (with some black people and a few Asian people and Latin people) representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.
Culture Clash: San Francisco journalist Eddie Brock, who has an antihero alter ego named Venom, becomes a fugitive suspect in a cop’s murder, and he travels to Nevada, where he gets mixed up with secret government activities involving outer-space aliens.
Culture Audience: “Venom: The Last Dance” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of the movies based on comic books, the movie’s headliners and mindless action flicks.

“Venom: The Last Dance” is so sloppily made and uninteresting, it’s an example of a sequel that doesn’t need to exist. Talented cast members are stuck in this dull and predictable comic book movie. “Venom: The Last Dance” also has an uneven tone, as the movie seems unsure of how far it should lean into the campy comedy that made the first two “Venom” movies more watchable than this underwhelming third “Venom” movie.
Written and directed by Kelly Marcel, “Venom: The Last Dance” is the follow-up to 2018’s “Venom” and 2021’s “Venom: Let There Be Carnage.” Marcel co-wrote “Venom” and “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” and makes her feature-film directorial debut with “Venom: The Last Dance.” People who’ve seen “Venom” and “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” are more likely to understand what’s going on in “Venom: The Last Dance” but are also more likely to be disappointed.
All of these “Venom” movies (which are based on Marvel Comic characters) have never been considered top-tier comic book adaptations. However, the “Venom” and “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” had more suspense that was a lot more entertaining to watch than what’s in “Venom: The Last Dance.” Unfortunately, “Venom: The Last Dance” just plods along until the very silly and unimaginative ending. All of the acting in the movie is lackluster or trite.
“Venom: The Last Dance” begins by showing San Francisco journalist Eddie Brock as a fugitive who is a suspect in the death of Detective Patrick Mulligan (played by Stephen Graham) of the San Francisco Police Department. Eddie, who is brash and somewhat brutish, has an alter ego named Venom, a pitch-black demon-like creature that lives inside Eddie’s body. In other words, Venom is a symbiote. Venom, who has an appetite for eating humans, comes out and attacks when Eddie is angry or needs help in the many fights that Eddie gets involved with in these movies.
Eddie finds himself trapped in a cell of a hideout used by a gang that engages in dog fighting. (The dogs are kept in cages.) Of course, Eddie uses Venom to break out of cell. Eddie and Venom then fight the gang members and get away. The entire beginning of the movie is so poorly explained, it would be understandable for anyone (including people who’ve seen the first two “Venom” movies) to be confused by what’s going on in the movie’s first few scenes.
Meanwhile, “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” (which takes place mostly in Nevada) jumps around from showing activities at the highly secretive Area 51 Military Base and the Area 55 Imperium Program. The Area 51 Military Base is supervised by General Strickland (played by Chiwetel Ejiofor), a rigid leader who is on the hunt for Eddie. Why? Because (mild spoiler alert) in “Venom: Let There Be Carnage,” Eddie was exposed as having Venom as a symbiote.
It turns out that Detective Mulligan really isn’t missing. He’s being held captive in the Area 55 Imperium Program, which is conducting experiments on him because Detective Mulligan has his own symbiote, which is green. General Strickland’s colleagues include the more laid-back scientists Dr. Teddy Paine (played by Juno Temple) and Sadie (played by Clark Backo), whose purposes in the movie become all too obvious when they handle the symbiote samples too closely.
While on the run, Eddie gets a ride from a family of four who are traveling in a van to Area 51. The family’s patriarch is a shaggy-haired weirdo named Martin (played by Rhys Ifans), who is obsessed with seeing outer-space aliens at Area 51. The other family members are Martin’s wife Nova (played by Alanna Ubach) and their two underage kids: teenage daughter Echo (played by Hala Finley) and pre-teen Leaf (played by Dash McCloud).
One of the silliest parts of “Venom: The Last Dance” is when Eddie ends up in Las Vegas and sees Mrs. Chen (played by Peggy Lu), the convenience store manager from San Francisco who found out about Venom in the first “Venom” movie. Mrs. Chen and Eddie see each other by chance in a casino and start dancing together to ABBA’s “Dancing Queen.” Yes, this really is in the movie. It’s supposed to be hilarious, but it just looks awkward.
Aside from all the mindless dialogue and the mediocre action scenes, “Venom: The Last Dance” has too much choppy editing that makes the flow of the movie sputter and stall like a failing engine. The new characters introduced in “Venom: The Last Dance” are very generic. And the few characters that aren’t generic (such as Martin) are very irritating.
And when you have a movie that takes place in Area 51, don’t be surprised to see outer-space aliens. But since this an action film, these aliens are not harmless-looking creatures who are shorter than the average humans. These aliens are giant monsters.
The back-and-forth banter between Eddie and Venom is one of the main reasons why people like the “Venom” movies. However, in “Venom: The Last Dance,” this banter seems very flat and not funny at all. There’s a sentimental montage toward the end of the movie that might get unintentional laughs.
“Venom: The Last Dance” has a mid-credits scene and an end-credits scene that hint at how the “Venom” saga could continue in movies, but these apparent sneak peeks don’t inspire much curiosity or enthusiasm. Fans of superhero/comic book movies have been burned by end-credits scenes that ended up going nowhere. (For example: “Eternals” and “Black Adam.”) “Venom: The Last Dance” is the worst type of sequel: A movie that doesn’t even try to have a good story and just reeks of “contractual obligations.”
Columbia Pictures will release “Venom: The Last Dance” in U.S. cinemas on October 25, 2024.