After an excruciatingly long wait, Eddie Brock and Venom have finally returned to theaters,
so let's dig in and talk about the ending of "Venom: Let There Be Carnage."
Obviously, many spoilers lie ahead.
"There's gonna be carnage."
Cletus Cassidy believes that people love a serial killer — Just ask him.
"People love serial killers." See?
But by the end of the film, Cletus has had Carnage run roughshod all over him, lost the only woman he
has ever loved, and finally revealed his true motive: he just wanted to be Eddie's friend.
"Miss you. So much." As Venom is quick to point out,
that position is already filled. Which is most likely why, after nearly two hours of
doing battle with him, Venom chomps off Cletus' head. Sorry, Cletus, it was fun while it lasted.
As for the issue of Carnage, a crawling ball of goo searching desperately for a new host,
Venom takes care of that problem too. Scooping up the red sludge, Venom sucks it up like a Slurpee.
In the comics, of course, Carnage is like a bad penny who just keeps turning up.
But in the "Venom" franchise, at least for the foreseeable future,
Cletus and Carnage both seem like they've taken that long, last trip
to the distant cathedral.
Fans were thrilled to learn that Frances Barrison would be a key character in "Venom: Let There Be
Carnage," and even more thrilled to learn that she'd be brought to life by Naomie Harris.
Harris is a veteran actor who has shined in films as varied as "Skyfall" and "Moonlight."
Fans will undoubtedly be happy with the result, as the character more commonly known
as Shriek features prominently throughout the film as the Bonnie to Kasady's Clyde,
cackling with glee as the ill-fated lovers go on a super-powered killing spree.
By the end of the movie, however, the love triangle of Cletus, Frances, and Carnage
is beginning to show some strain. For starters, Shriek's main weapon is a brain-scrambling scream
that doesn't pair well with symbiotes' sensitivity to high sonic energy. Every time Carnage seems
to be getting into a groove, Shriek lets out a scream, knocking the big red guy off his game.
After she seemingly dispatches Detective Mulligan, Shriek has one final confrontation with the two
symbiotes. Echoing early comic book appearances of Venom, this smackdown involves a massive
church bell whose every ring pummels the senses of the symbiotes. Knocked off her perch during the
battle, Shriek falls to her seeming death.
A great deal of "Let There Be Carnage" concerns itself with the uneasy, highly
non-traditional relationship between Eddie and Venom. Sharing a goal, an apartment, and a body,
the duo undoubtedly get on each other's nerves, but need each other to survive and thrive.
By the end of the film, this odd couple seems to have finally made up. The immediate villains
are gone, and they've turned their focus on the next adventure — one that will seemingly
interact with "Spider-Man: No Way Home." But first, Venom needs some well-deserved R&R.
Perhaps not since the training scene of Rocky III has it felt so good to watch
two heroes frolicking together on a beach. Most importantly, Venom has indeed come out
of the so-called "Eddie Brock closet" for good. The journalist seems more comfortable
with letting his freak flag fly, as long as Venom does its best to only feast on those who really,
really deserve it.
A key character in this film is Detective Mulligan, played by the always excellent,
always intense character actor Stephen Graham. In the opening scenes of "Carnage," we see a
young Mulligan attempting to thwart an escape by Shriek, shooting her in the
eye but nearly losing his life in the process. Clearly, Frances Barrison knows how to hold a
grudge as decades later, Shriek pins the detective to the ground and presses a thumb into his eye.
After the perceived death of Shriek, we see a very brief shot that not
only indicates Graham is still alive, but that he might also now be super-powered.
What does this mean? Who could Mulligan become? Fans will undoubtedly spend the
immediate aftermath of the film's release poring over possibilities, but perhaps we could start the
conversation by throwing out one: Toxin. In the 2004 Venom/Carnage miniseries,
Carnage created Toxin, who then bonded with an NYPD cop named Patrick Mulligan.
Mulligan ended up talking things out with Spider-Man and agreeing
to try and harness the symbiote, who could be considered Venom's grandson, to fight crime.
It's also well known that in the comics, Shriek can use her powers to simply turn people evil, so
perhaps Mulligan is merely now an evil Mulligan.
Perhaps the most significant revelation in the final moments of "Let There Be Carnage" comes at
the end. This mid-credit sequence depicts Venom and Eddie in a hotel room together,
watching foreign language soap operas. As the two begin exchanging thoughts on
the show they're watching, Venom makes an intoxicating offer — what if he were to
give Eddie Brock just the tiniest glimpse of all that's going through his superior brain?
Eddie opts in. Once Venom begins the download, the room starts spinning, lights start flashing — and
Eddie wakes up in a very different room, this one playing a different program on the television.
Sure enough, it's J. Jonah Jameson, making his multiverse-shattering announcement that Spider-Man
is really Peter Parker. Venom gets in close to the TV to take in the news, and when he sees Parker,
he begins to lick the television. "I want Spider-Maaaaaan!"
As fans have seen in the "No Way Home" trailer, Jameson's announcement is the catalyst for
everything that happens in that film — causing Peter to seek out Doctor
Strange to presumably meddle with the multiverse in a way that allows such
previous franchise threats as Doctor Octopus and Electro to once again pose a threat.
Of course, the Venom we see in these Tom Hardy films is a lot nicer than the
character is typically portrayed — but even if he is putting the "hero" in anti-hero,
it seems likely that Venom will not be approaching Spider-Man with a tentacle extended in friendship.
At the very least, this mid-credits sequence establishes that this film's conclusion coincides
with the "Far From Home" opening — which makes a crossover feel quite inevitable.
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