How Venom Just Broke Box Office Records
1. The Backlash To Critics
Though they haven't done what Warner Bros did with their "war on the critics" by using the backlash against "real" critics to market Suicide Squad, there is still an element of fans proclaiming a disconnect between their expectations and the critical response. That is naturally amplified by the fact that the immediate reactions on Rotten Tomatoes to Venom were so venomous, ironically.
There is no way Venom deserves to be sitting on 30% (and it was lower than this initially) and any fan who goes in without any expectations will be of the same thinking. Sure, it's not the best movie in the world by any stretch of the imagination, but all voting it that low will do is inspire scorn, particularly when there was so much negativity about the film well before it was even released.
Thanks to poor trailers, critical expectations were low and it's probably fair to say that fans have had enough of critics being given too much power to shape a film's performance. That's why the conversation about films being "made for fans" has changed so much to marginalise the relevance of critical reactions now and how it becomes part of the marketing of films, even unconsciously.
If critics are united in their dislike of a movie - particularly one aimed so consciously at an established fanbase - there will inevitably now be some blow-back. That's just the post-Fake News world we live in, where so-called "expert" voices aren't useful unless they're wildly positive or match your own opinion. That should work well for Venom.
Have you seen Venom? Share your reactions below in the comments thread.