After Sony Pictures pulled the trigger on developing a sequel to 2008’s Venom that would pit Tom Hardy’s symbiote against his classic Marvel Comics rival, Carnage, the visual effects team quickly got to work making sure that they delivered a version of the iconic villain that fans would recognize and love. In a new interview, VFX supervisor Sheena Duggal revealed that she went down a rabbit hole of Instagram, Reddit, and Twitter fan art to make sure the sequel got the look of Carnage just right.
“I wanted to see what they wanted from this character and what behavior and look was important to them,” Duggal told Variety. “We wanted fans to be very happy with this.”
However, thanks to its PG-13 rating, the movie couldn’t entirely adapt some of Carnage’s more gruesome moments, which resulted in one scene landing on the cutting room floor for using a bit too much tongue. Via Variety:
One sequence inspired from the comic books but deemed too gruesome for the audience was Carnage putting his tongue down someone’s throat as a way to kill them. “We had to tone that back a bit. He does it with a tentacle [in the comics], but I thought it would be fun to have him use his tongue to add that extra gruesome element.” In the end, the sequence was toned down considerably for the big screen.
Clearly, the VFX team nailed the look of the classic Marvel rivals as Venom: Let There Be Carnage delivered the biggest weekend opening since 2019’s Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker. Then again, who doesn’t want to see Tom Hardy and Woody Harrelson battle it out as wild tentacle monsters for 90 minutes? Those tickets sell themselves, and the proof is in the alien goo pudding.
(Via Variety)