After hearing about the exclusive Venom footage Sony showed off at Comic-Con this year, symbiote fans were pumped for the studio to release something more to the general public. With its release date coming up later this year, Sony has now unveiled a new trailer for the movie with tons of shots of actor Tom Hardy as Venom as well as our first shots of Riot, the symbiote that Eddie Brock will have to fight.
Back in April, the trailer the studio released gave us a good idea what the movie is about. Eddie Brock is a journalist investigating Dr. Carlton Drake, who is doing experiments on people involving the symbiotes, which were collected from the debris of a spaceship. Somehow, Brock and a symbiote–named Venom–become united, and Brock deals with trying to keep his sanity and control of his body.
Venom stars Tom Hardy as Eddie Brock, Michelle Williams as Anne Weying, and Riz Ahmed as Dr. Carlton Drake. At the Comic-Con panel, Ahmed described his character as a genius who asks, “What does the future of humanity look like?” Apparently, it’s an evolution of the human species by way of symbiotic bonding.
With the release of the latest trailer, we know a bit more about what’s going on in this movie, including who is playing the symbiotic villain towards the end of the video. There is also another person with a symbiote attached to them as well, and a few more shots of Venom we haven’t seen before.
Riot is a prominent part of the trailer, and he comes to the big-screen following his comic debut in 1993. He has a history with Drake in the comics that the upcoming movie appears to be drawing on. You can read more about that in our explainer, Who is Riot?
Here’s everything new and notable from the fresh Venom trailer. Venom comes to theaters on October 5.
Different color symbiotes
In previous trailers, we saw multiple containers with symbiotes in them. The one above is yellow, which quickly reminded me of the miniseries Lethal Protector, where the Life Foundation unleashed five new symbiotes. Both Phage and Scream were orange and yellow, respectively. Could this be one of those two?
Drake is running experiments
We’ve seen this before in previous trailers, but Drake seems very hands-on with his work. We see yet another symbiote, and it looks different from the one in the previous slide. If so, that means Sony could be fully adapting Lethal Protector, sans Spider-Man.
The battle for Brock
Brock is having an internal struggle for his mind and body, and much like the last trailer, we see that Brock is having visual hallucinations, seeing Venom in the window of a card. Additionally, he’s going though physical changes as we his body change as he fights off Venom.
Things are getting weird
There’s a brief scene featuring Venom’s face coming off of Brock’s body and talking to him.
Venom is huge
Up to this point, we haven’t seen how large Venom is. In the comics, he’s a lot bigger than Spider-Man and other heroes in the Marvel Universe. In a wide-shot, we see Venom holding someone up. Venom towers over this guy.
Yes, he’s licking that guy
Is it weird to say that an iconic part of Venom is his ridiculously long tongue? Yeah? Well, it’s in the trailer, and he licks a guy. This probably won’t be the only time we see something like this.
More symbiotes
Aside from Venom and the one we think may be Scream, there’s also actress Michelle Williams who uses a symbiote to create a blade-like weapon coming out of her arm. Williams is playing Donna Diego in the film, and in the comics, Diego is better known as Scream.
Riot is here
Without a doubt, this is Riot, the symbiote Venom will be fighting in the movie. Riot is a lot like Venom. He’s large, powerful, and overall, just a gigantic brute.
Who is Riot? Spoilers!
At the very end of the trailer, we see both Venom and Riot being torn apart, and the person inside the Riot symbiote is none other than Carlton Drake. That’s a bit of a divergence from the comic, as Drake didn’t bond with a symbiote. However, he did become a spider-monster in Spider-Man: The Arachnis Project.