50 Fun Facts About Venom

Who plays Eddie Brock?

His son was a big Venom fan; Hardy signed on quickly after leaving Triple Frontier and was paid $7 million.

Who directed Venom?

The Zombieland director was chosen after a long search; David F. Sandberg met with Sony but chose Shazam! instead.

What is Eddie Brock's job?

He loses it after ambushing Carlton Drake with questions he could only have got from his fiancée's confidential files.

What is the name of the corporation whose probe brings the symbiotes to Earth?

It comes from the comics' Venom: Lethal Protector, which also gave the film its San Francisco setting.

Where does the corporation's ship crash after one of the creatures escapes?

That symbiote is Riot, which hops from body to body across the world to reach San Francisco.

Who plays CEO Carlton Drake?

Matt Smith, Pedro Pascal and Matthias Schoenaerts were all considered for the role.

Who plays Anne Weying, Eddie's ex-fiancée?

She added Anne's line 'I love you, but I love myself more' as a nod to the MeToo movement.

Which scientist helps Eddie break into the research facility, and is played by Jenny Slate?

Drake punishes her betrayal by exposing her to the last captive symbiote, which kills them both.

Who is hosting the creature when it transfers to Eddie during the break-in?

Melora Walters plays her; John Jameson, a nod to J. Jonah Jameson's astronaut son, briefly hosts Riot instead.

What are the creature's two weaknesses, according to Eddie?

Anne exploits the first with an MRI machine to rip Venom out of him.

What machine does Anne use to separate Venom from Eddie?

Dr. Dan Lewis has just told them the alien is rotting Eddie's organs.

What is the name of the fourth alien, which bonds with Drake?

A minor comics character, which gave the designers freedom: he is a foot taller than Venom and nearly twice as heavy.

Anne briefly becomes what comic-book character in order to free Eddie?

Fleischer kept the Easter egg secret until release and hoped it might lead to a standalone film.

Where does the final fight between Venom and Riot take place?

Venom wrecks the probe as it lifts off; the effects team gave the pad a bright, comic-book look on purpose.

Whom does Eddie interview in the mid-credits scene?

Woody Harrelson took the tiny part knowing it would grow into a much bigger villain role in the sequel.

Who plays Dr. Dan Lewis, Anne's new boyfriend?

The Veep actor's doctor is unusually decent for a rival love interest, and ends up helping Eddie.

What plays after the credits?

It shows Shameik Moore's Miles Morales and Jake Johnson's Peter B. Parker two months before that film opened.

What is Stan Lee's cameo?

'Don't give up on her. Either of you,' he tells Eddie, apparently addressing the symbiote too.

Hardy compared the Eddie-Venom relationship to which cartoon duo?

Fleischer preferred to call it a hybrid rather than a Jekyll-and-Hyde or werewolf story.

What did Hardy base his delivery of Venom's lines on?

It was then modulated to sound more sinister; Brad Venable added grunts and shared lines like 'We are Venom'.

How did Hardy hear Venom's lines while acting scenes where the two argue?

He had used the same trick playing the Kray twins in Legend.

What did Hardy improvise climbing into on a restaurant set, forcing an overnight rebuild?

The tank had to be reinforced and filled with fake lobsters so he could get in the next day.

Which two comic-book stories was the film primarily based on?

Lethal Protector was the first solo Venom series, which helped the writers break the character free from Spider-Man.

Why could Spider-Man not appear in the film?

So the writers turned to the Ultimate Marvel version of Venom, whose origin does not involve Spider-Man.

Which Venom line was lifted word for word from The Amazing Spider-Man #374?

Fleischer insisted on honouring the comics' violence: 'It would be weird to make a movie with Venom if he wasn't' biting heads off.

What rating did the film end up with after Sony backed away from an R?

Executives feared an R would complicate crossovers with the family-friendly Spider-Man.

Which action star was in talks to play Venom in a 1997 New Line project written by David S. Goyer?

The same red symbiote villain was planned even then; the rights later moved to Sony with Spider-Man's.

Who played Eddie Brock in Spider-Man 3, the character's first screen appearance?

Sam Raimi had been reluctant to use the character, citing his 'lack of humanity'; producer Avi Arad pushed for him.

Which director left the Venom project to make The Hunger Games?

Josh Trank then pitched an R-rated take 'in the vein of The Mask', which producer Matt Tolmach disliked.

What was the film called during its 2014 incarnation in Sony's Amazing Spider-Man universe?

Alex Kurtzman was to direct; the plan collapsed when The Amazing Spider-Man 2 underperformed and Sony teamed with Marvel Studios.

Which Chinese company quietly covered about a third of the film's production costs?

Sony's final budget was $100 million; the film went on to make an 'insane' $262 million in China.

What was the main criticism of the first teaser trailer?

Fleischer later admitted the character's effects simply were not finished in time.

How did Jenny Slate pronounce 'symbiote' in a trailer, to widespread mockery?

Searches for the pronunciation rose 35,700 percent; the film uses SIM-bee-oht, and Merriam-Webster noted both are acceptable.

Where were most of the film's San Francisco street scenes actually shot?

DNEG had to digitally remove Coca-Cola signs and CNN logos that gave the Georgia locations away; real San Francisco pickups came in January.

Whose eyes did the effects supervisor compare Venom's to?

Without pupils, the eyes had to be animated in an exaggerated way to show where he was looking.

Which two actors inspired the way Venom talks through clenched teeth?

His long tongue had its own rig so it could retract and let him speak, which the team found 'too comical' otherwise.

Why does the film's Venom lack the white spider symbol from the comics?

A subtle 'V' of white veins was added instead so an all-black character could be seen at night.

Who composed the score, his second Marvel film after Black Panther?

He had worked with Fleischer on 30 Minutes or Less.

Which rapper released a tie-in single called "Venom"?

It was a bonus track on Kamikaze, released at the end of August 2018.

What record did the film's debut set?

It beat Gravity's $55.8 million from 2013, and its Columbus Day Monday set another October record.

Roughly how much did Venom gross worldwide?

That made it the seventh-biggest film of 2018 and, briefly, the second-biggest superhero origin film after Black Panther.

Which country was by far the film's biggest market outside the U.S. and Canada?

It opened there in November to $111 million and was granted a rare 30-day extension of its run.

What was the film's CinemaScore grade?

Critics were harsher: reviews were generally negative, though Hardy's performance was praised.

What name did fans give to the Eddie-Venom romantic pairing that dominated Tumblr after release?

Sony leaned in and marketed the home release as a romantic comedy about the two of them.

Who directed the 2021 sequel?

Fleischer was busy with Zombieland: Double Tap; Kelly Marcel then made her directing debut on The Last Dance in 2024.

How tall is Venom portrayed as being in the film?

He weighs in at 500 pounds; a 6-foot-10 stand-in in a helmet was sometimes used on set for eyelines.

Which visual effects house created Venom and Riot for the 2018 film?

Supervisor Paul Franklin's team studied slime moulds to make the shapeless symbiotes look 'predatory and threatening'.

Which actors were considered for the Carlton Drake role before Riz Ahmed was cast?

Tatiana Maslany and Lashana Lynch also auditioned for roles in the film.

Who was Venom's director of photography?

Principal photography began on October 23, 2017, with Oliver Scholl returning as production designer after Spider-Man: Homecoming.

How does the villain Riot compare in size to Venom in the film?

Because Riot is a minor comics character, designers had freedom to give him a 'brutal metallic', almost reptilian look.