Venom: 10 Scrapped Scenes And Characters Revealed By New Concept Art
Newly surfaced Venom concept art reveals scrapped scenes and characters not in the movie!
Venom was released in 2018 to mostly negative reviews, but moviegoers gravitated towards the Marvel Comics adaptation, and it ended up grossing over $850 million at the worldwide box office. There was certainly a lot to love about the first of Sony's Spider-Man spinoffs (Tom Hardy's madcap performance, for starters), but the execution was flawed, and it's no bad thing that the sequel has a new director.
Like any movie, it seems Venom underwent some major changes during pre-production, and some newly surfaced concept art by Paolo Giandoso reveals just how different it might have been.
From moments which didn't make the final cut - including a totally different final battle and more bizarre Eddie Brock/Venom interactions - to characters who were M.I.A. from the final cut, there's a lot to delve into here. While Carlton Drake/Riot was ultimately Venom's forgettable lead villain, it seems the original plan was for Carnage to square off with the titular anti-hero.
It goes without saying that would have been a game-changer for the movie, but does this artwork reveal anything about what fans can expect from next year's Venom: Let There Be Carnage? If some of these ideas carry over into Andy Serkis' sequel, then it's certainly possible...
10. A Terrifying New Take On Riot
One of Venom's biggest issues was its villain, Riot. Carlton Drake was a forgettable big bad with unclear motivations, and Riz Ahmed was largely wasted on a character who would have been better suited to the mostly terrible superhero movies from the mid-2000s. Even when he transformed into Riot, he just looked like a generic Venom copycat!
This concept art reveals just how different he could have looked, though, and this Riot is vastly more sinister than the version in the finished product. The symbiote radiates off its host, while the glowing eyes and long tongue make this alien look vastly different to the one that bonded with Eddie Brock.
Venom was supposedly a loser on his planet, and something of a runt. That might go some way in explaining why Riot looked so much more formidable, and it's interesting to wonder whether the alien which had bonded with Drake was almost too powerful for its host, hence why those tendrils appear to be radiating an alien energy.