‘Venom: The Last Dance’ Thankfully Avoided 1 Insanely Foolish Mistake That Makes Joker 2’s Failure Look Deserved
- Venom: The Last Dance is the highly anticipated third installment of the Venom trilogy.
- Venom 3 did audience test screenings prior to release, unlike Joker 2.
- Warner Bros. allegedly made the decision to not do test screenings for Joker 2.
The highly anticipated third installment of the Venom franchise, Venom: The Last Dance is finally out. This is one of the many superhero outings this year following the release of the likes of Deadpool & Wolverine, Joker 2, and The Penguin. All of these projects stood out to the audience in their own ways, but fans did not find Joker 2 particularly thrilling.
The past two installments of Venom have done well at the box office even if not as well as the first Joker movie which made more than a billion dollars at the box office. However, considering Joker 2’s performance, there is a good chance that Venom 3 will perform better. This looks especially possible because the latter film has not made the same mistake as the Joaquin Phoenix-starrer.
Venom: The Last Dance Has Not Made the Same Mistake as Joker: Folie á Deux
The Venom trilogy is a part of Sony’s Spider-Man Universe (SSU). While SSU is not the favorite when it comes to superhero movies, it certainly has been able to maintain the quality when it comes to this particular Marvel anti-hero. The humor, intensity, and unique dynamic between Eddie Brock and Venom have been able to draw the audiences to the theatres so far.
As the title suggests, Venom: The Last Dance marks the conclusion of the trilogy of the anti-hero’s adventures with Tom Hardy’s Eddie Brock. It marks Kelly Marcel’s directorial debut and also sees the entry of new cast members like Chiwetel Ejiofor and Juno Temple.
Much like any other movie, this movie too had test screenings. In a recent interview for Collider Interviews, Hardy and Marcel were asked how the screenings helped them understand if they needed to make any edits or anything of that sort. Marcel said:
We learned a lot from the screenings, which was ultimately that it was kind of working.
She said that having creative freedom in the movie was a boon and that she and Hardy had seen it come together from start to finish. The key takeaway from this is that the screenings worked. Unfortunately, Joker 2 did not have the privilege of having audience screenings before release, which proved to be quite fatal for its overall performance.
Warner Bros. Was Reportedly Not in Favor of Audience Screenings for Joker 2
Fans loved Joaquin Phoenix‘s portrayal of the popular DC villain Joker in the eponymous first movie. The anticipation for a sequel was high, but it quickly turned into disappointment when the trailers showed that it had musical elements. This was not the best look for a superhero movie.
The creators of the film would have realized this if they had cared to do the test screenings. According to a report on Matt Belloni’s Puck newsletter, Warner Bros. was confident that the $200 million they had invested in the movie would yield good results. That evidently did not turn out to be the case as it has proved to be a box office bomb, with a ‘D’ CinemaScore rating.
Venom: The Last Dance is now in theatres.
