How Many Venom Movies Did Tom Hardy Sign Up For?
The following article contains spoilers for "Venom: Let There Be Carnage" and "Spider-Man: No Way Home."
While the Marvel Cinematic Universe continues to dominate the box office and pop culture conversations and the DC Extended Universe looks to course-correct its path with the reality-altering "Flash" solo movie, there's one hero who occupies an intriguing space among all of this.
Sony's "Venom" movies, starring Tom Hardy as Eddie Brock, are some of the most unhinged comic book flicks to come out in modern memory. The 2018 movie "Venom" established the character as existing in his own universe, while "Venom: Let There Be Carnage" opened up a multiverse of possibilities. That film ended with Eddie Brock being transported to a new dimension, namely the MCU occupied by Tom Holland's Spider-Man. Naturally, the mid-credits scene of "Spider-Man: No Way Home" showed Eddie promptly being returned to his reality, but not before leaving behind a piece of the symbiote in the MCU.
It certainly seems like there's more in store for the character, but plenty of fans out there likely can't help but ask the question of how much longer Tom Hardy will continue being in the comic book realm.
Tom Hardy signed as Venom for three movies
Back in 2018, Tom Hardy revealed he had signed on to play Venom in three movies (via CBR). In an interview with Total Film Magazine, he sang the character's praises, stating, "I'm open to whatever you want to do with it. We've signed up for three of them. So it's very much an open case. We'll see what people's responses are to it. I think it's an awesome character. I love playing both of them."
In that same interview, Hardy even seemingly predicted how the character would go on to attach itself to other big-screen franchises. "It's an amuse-bouche, and for Sony, it's the Venom-verse launched in isolation, as it were," he mentioned. "We all prepped for it to be a standalone universe. So whatever Sony wants to attach to it at a later date, it's a fulcrum piece. But let's see what happens when it lands." This naturally happened with the MCU as Eddie Brock momentarily joined the reality with Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) and Thanos (Josh Brolin) before being sent back to the "Sony"-verse.
For those of you keeping score at home, Hardy has technically played Venom in three films already. There are the first two standalone "Venom" movies, and he appeared in the mid-credits scene for "Spider-Man: No Way Home." Fortunately, it looks like he has no plans to hang up the symbiote at this point as "Venom 3" is already in development (via IGN). From there, the future's incredibly bright for the Lethal Protector.