With Venom and Venom 2: Let There Be Carnage grossing more than $1.3 billion at the box office worldwide, it was only a matter of time before Venom 3 got the green light. When the film was actually confirmed at the CinemaCon cinema show in April 2022, Studio Sony owed even further details about the Marvel sequel. Not much has happened since then. The American trade magazine but at least has now been able to figure out who is probably the most important person behind the scenes and reveal who will be in the director’s chair in the sequel.
The screenwriter and former actress Kelly Marcel will direct “Venom 3” and make her directorial debut with the blockbuster hit. Marcel follows in the footsteps of Ruben Fleischer (“Venom 1”) and Andy Serkis (“Venom 2”). The latter, in particular, was long considered a possible director for the third part, but now makes way for Marcel, who already has a lot of “Venom” experience.
From “Fifty Shades of Gray” to “Venom”
After Kelly Marcel has been in front of the camera in the film and series industry, mainly in smaller roles, she has been working mainly as an author and producer for several years now. Here she created the short-lived sci-fi series Terra Nova, before gaining more attention and acclaim as co-writer of the feel-good Mary Poppins genesis Saving Mr. bank.
This eventually gave the Briton the task of adapting the first installment of the SM bestselling series Fifty Shades Of Gray for the big screen – a process that Marcel isn’t looking forward to with massive interference from template author EL James (which is probably why she no longer involved in the sequels). The golden raspberry she got for the script at the time probably didn’t make the whole experience any better.
» “Venom” in the stream: on Amazon Prime Video* / at Disney+* / at Netflix
In addition to working on the Disney movie “Cruella” and developing her upcoming Apple horror series “The Changeling”, Marcel has also focused on the “Venom” movies in recent years. After revising the original screenplay for the first part and being appointed as the author of the second part from the beginning, she will also take on this task for part 3 – and now directing it for the first time. An obvious choice, given that she knows the titular Spider-Man villain’s journey on the big screen to date – as does protagonist Tom Hardy, with whom she will re-develop the film’s story, and insiders according to Venom should be very much on the same wavelength.
What’s the next step in Venom 3?
It is certain that we will see/hear Tom Hardy again in “Venom 3” as reporter Eddie Brock and his associated alien symbiote Venom. So far, however, there is no information about the further cast or plot of the sequel. At least one appearance of the symbiote Toxin seems to be almost certain after the end of “Venom: Let There Be Carnage”.
» “Venom: Let There Be Carnage” in the stream: at WOW (formerly Sky Ticket)*
But will there be bigger connections to the so-called SSU (short for Sony’s Spider-Man Universe), which Sony is currently building with the adversaries from the Spider-Man universe and which “Morbius” has belonged to until now? The formation of the villainous group Sinister Six could potentially play a role, most recently alluded to in “Morbius.” Perhaps the Marvel partnership between Sony and Disney also provides another link to the MCU, in which Venom was allowed to at least stop for a while before returning to his own universe.
MOVIESTARTS YouTube moderator also speculates on these and other possibilities in his next preview video for “Venom 3”. It is still unclear when the film will be released. Since the sequel is still in an early stage of development, we don’t expect a cinema release until 2024 at the earliest.