Where was the Venom 2018 movie licensed products?
 

Very surprised there wasn't a major push of Venom collectibles shown at Comic con. Sure, Hasbro/Marvel has their boring comics wave, but I expected to see a Hot Toys Eddie Brock/Venom, Funko Pop movie Venom, a few sculptures, or a Neca 18" toy, etc. I knew we wouldn't get movie toys, due to the rating and Hasbro/Marvel ignoring movie Deadpool for figures, as well as Logan, instead opting to release more bland comics figures.

While I'm not expecting cake toppers and cute toddler t-shirts, I am shocked nothing has been shown, now that so many saw Venom at comic con, and his face is known, so there's not a lot of surprise to protect. We haven't even seen blacked out silhouettes of work in progress.

I'm a little worried and disappointed. I've been looking forward to this moment for 30 years (Spidey 3 was a mere appetizer)...

It’s because of the R raining I’m sure, they don’t want to be seen as marketing “toys” from a violent movie to “kids”, but youd think companies like Funko and NECA would do something? Though I will say I haven’t gotten a great look at venom yet (last trailer I saw was just a face shot at the end) maybe the costume has some spoiler they don’t want to get out? Or the movies going to be really dark or violent?

Shouldn't affect Hot Toys, Neca, or Funko. Whole costume, from what I've heard from a friend who was at Comic Con, basically is oozy black, with thin flowing "milky white" mucus "veins" flowing and oozing at random around the chest (like carnage flows red and black in comics).

Sony has always been a great marketer of their films and pusher of merchandise. This silence doesn't bode well. Maybe their confidence will be boosted next year, if the film is successful?

Odds are the movie won't be successful, at least not critically. Even the most ardent Venom fans have expressed dissapointment in the movie so far, and while the symbiote itself looks cool, that ain't always enough to sell toys and things. Plus, odds are Sony is doing this movie on a low budget, so they probably didn't wanna deal with paying to have merchandise made when they know Venom will put butts in seats just by brand recognition alone.

I think the R rating is the problem. Deadpool 1 & 2 and Logan were all rated R and none of theme have received any merchandise outside of the Hot Toys Deadpool and the Funko Pop Bob Ross Deadpool. Funko looks to have some Pops of Venom, Carnage, and Venomized heroes coming out around the time of the movie but everything is comic related.

It could also be the CGI hasn't been completely finalized yet for all of the characters so companies haven't had a chance to complete any merchandise.

Really? Because hasn't Funko made like 80% of their profit on Deadpool Merch for the past few years? Or does it just seem that way?

It's comic Deadpool stuff, not movie related. The only company that's done movie Deadpool merch was Hot Toys.

Another factor for the lack of toys may just be simple timeline issues. At Comic-Con last year the Hasbro team mentioned that they sometimes miss out on highlighting characters from Fox's movies because they don't share plans with them early on. The Venom movie came together so fast that there simply may not have been time to provide the models and references needed for Hasbro to make movie Venom toys.

https://i.imgur.com/NydhDKM.png

They didn't even mention Venom at Comic-Con lmao.

It’s a real shame, but the Tom hardy Venom is starting to feel like the dolph lungron punisher to me. Like a random sci-fi flick about a symbiot landed on Sony’s desk and some exec was like “ change the main characters name to eddy, make the alien black, and bam! We’ll call it venom!” Without spider man, at least for the origin story, you’d be hard pressed to sell me a venom movie. I love the character, and Tom hardy is awesome (I’d rather have him do wolverine in the MCU, but what ever) but I’m sorry, Venom needs spider man, shit they share DNA for god sake! It would be like doing an X 23 movie without acknowledging wolverines existence.

I'm a big Venom/symbiote fan. Everything from trailers and spyshots so far released tell me the film will only attract people who know about Venom. Other than that, i don't see flocks of people rushing to go see this. As far as marketing for toys and such well he technically won't look like the Venom we all know and love. No white spider on the chest, no connection thus far to spider man etc

While i will most definitely go see it, i'm honestly expecting much. I mean it is a sony movie we're talking about.

Maybe I have unrealistic hopes... afterall, Spider-Man 3 was the most successful of the Spiderman films, and it WASN'T because people wanted to see Sandman or Gobby Jr.

I see a lot of internet wrath for it, but the people I see on an daily basis or out and about seem very positive. The fact it's a record-breaking internet trailer also gives me tons of optimism. Really hope it sets October records. I have a feeling Silver & Black and Morbius won't go anywhere.
Venom could really support a 3 movie trilogy, but not a "Universe"... origin movie, maximum carnage adaptation (support Morbius and S&B spinoffs), then Planet of the Symbiotes/ Web of Shadows game influenced world invasion by symbiotes.

I LOVE the fact they dropped the Spider-Man connection, as it's the weakest aspect of Venom. Makes him seem pathetic, not a real villain. More like a temper tantrum...

Also, the look is spot-on, imho. Yeah, there isn't a white spider, but from people I know who were in Hall H, Venom has quite a bit of white on his chest.

Anyway, back to topic... Yeah, I never expected Hasbro to make movie figures. They never did for Logan, Deadpool, Blade, etc. But as I said, it's the Hot Toys and Funko that surprises me. They make figures of almost everything, along with a Sideshow statue or two.

Spidey is the weakest? He doesn’t exist without Spidey. Thats integral to the origin or you just have an alien movie.

Sure he can. The living costume originated as a concept for Ironfist. The movie, cartoons, and Ultimate comic all prove you don't have to carbon copy the original story. And honestly, the original story has aged poorly a LOT.
Venom needs a retconn/reboot origin more than Superman, batman, xmen, or wolverine. The human temper tantrum bonded to a bitter jealous ex-girlfriend symbiote is lame, and really was never intended to be a lasting character. The symbiote was the character. Eddie was expendable. Unfortunately, fanboys loved him, so Marvel's plans for killing off Eddie and having the symbiote jump around the marvel world was stopped for a while. Eddie wasn't even the original Venom. He was a last minute add. Original Venom was supposed to be a woman who miscarried her pregnancy due to a Spidey vs baddy battle. Marvel execs thought that was too dark, so they changed it to a temper-tantruming bodybuilder, popular in the late 80's comics.

God that new Venom trailer was rough, no wonder no one is making any movie product

Or because it was a sequel to a movie that was hailed as a modern classic and one of the best superhero movies ever made. The hype going into Spider-Man 3 was insane.

It was Venom. News stories headlined Venom was the villain. Venom graced the aisles on displays at stores. Black suited spidey was the teaser image. That movie was sold on Venom. Every store was sold out of anything Venom related. The 3 times I saw it in theaters, the cheers erupted when the suit took Pete over, when Venom formed, and when venom talked to sandman. No one was there for sandman or goby jr.

On media surveys for spidey 1 and 2, Venom was top of the polls for villains wanted in a Spiderman movie. He’s got a cult following beyond that of almost any marvel character.

The only one there to see sandman was Thomas Haden Church and his mother.

The character who is widely considered one of the most disappointing aspects of the film? Sure.

I believe Webz meant that Venom is what drew people to buy tickets. It's hard to deny that the prevailing opinion is that Sony completely dropped the ball with Venom in Spider-Man 3 but he was something to hype the film. Before I saw the movie I was pretty stoked to get to see Venom on the big screen, afterwards the letdown only further contributed to my disliking the film.

For R rated content that's not fully MCU tied as yet, that content won't happen until after the movie proves itself in popularity and box office/reception.

Same was true for Deadpool. Where the amount of side content outside of the cutesy and comic book stuff didn't happen until after the movie proved to be such a huge success. Then everyone jumped on it. Same pattern here.

On new unproven film IPs, caution is usually common. Unless it's a blockbuster all audiences/market type. Avatar, Pacific Rim, Tron Legacy, Robocop, Reel Steel, all getting toylines for their movies, but none of those were R rated either. Venom doesn't have that kind of mainstream kid appeal to warrant that as yet due to the R rating. But if it performs exceedingly well like it looks like it will, expect a lot of product for collectors to follow in its wake.

Spidey 3 on the other hand was an all audience and kid focused toy line. It has the same blockbuster film toy formula as others with higher expectations because it's spider-man and had previous high toy sales to further cement it. Comparing the two doesn't work. Different intended audiences and expectations. Made at a different time too. Even MCU stuff and Homecoming didn't quite get the same product line support Spider-man used to get. You also have to keep into consideration that Spider-man 3 is right after Hasbro bought the toy license too. So it was one of their first major motion picture toylines for Marvel.

Really? I loved it. So did thousands of others across reddit, many magazine critics, etc. I’d say there is more positive hype than negative fanboy pessimism, especially compared to the teaser trailer where people were whining about their raped childhoods.

I hope Mafex will end up making a movie Venom, their comic movie figures are the best in 1/12 scale for my money.

I'm sure a lot of it will depend on how the movie does, but I'm hopeful for it.

Probably will. And Hot Toys will get around to it too later.
In many instances like this, their stuff doesn't come until after the movies anyway once interest is largely there on the collector/fan side.

And depending on what Spider-man FFH's toyline is like, we might get some stuff in that too from Hasbro.
That one may be getting a slightly larger toyline than Homecoming did, since homecoming had such a surge of positive responses. So I could see them slotting in some extra stuff from Venom there to round it out more.

That and Infinity War 2, we might see a resurgence of the 4 inch figure style again as well, or that might be saved for the full beginning of phase 4 with the new movie slate. FFH is still considered tail end of phase 3 or "aftermath". With Phase 4's slate coming later. GOTG vol 3 might be considered "aftermath" stuff too. Depending on how much it gets pushed back because of the new director needed unless they bring James Gunn back on and tell Cernovich to shove it up his... Because of Cernovich's proclivities and actual actions as opposed to Gunn's poor taste tweets that were more mocking stereotypes thrown at him.

Though I do think GOTG could do with some dialogue tweaks, but a lot of that also has to do with these are supposed to be a ragtag team of misfits and losers/idiots so many of the characters are apt to say ridiculous things. By comparison, it's much tamer than the dialogue in the UK series Misfits, and it's supposed to evoke that same kind of basis.

The new trailer looks kinda iffy to me. I mean I watched the movie Locke which is just Tom Hardy driving in a car the whole time and was pretty compelled throughout... but I don't know if even he can carry this movie.

Fair enough. For me, When I was in my 20’s, I had an entire comics bin box with every ... yes, EVERY appearance of Venom (not including reprints). From just a hand pushing Spidey off a building before his reveal, guest appearances in darkhawk, to Venom being implanted with a bomb to work with the government.

Aside from the white spider missing (in a live action horror film, it would look as garish and silly as Hugh Jackman in yellow tights), this version of Venom really reflects the tone of the mid 90’s version of the character. The humor is definitely “Lethal Protector”ish. The look really reminds me of the “Spirits of Vengeance” appearance of Venom.

I think the big problem people are having with the film is that they are limiting themselves to Venom from asm 300 to asm 365. When you look at the character through the lens of his entire body of appearances, he’s had a ton of different versions, even in the 616 universe. I look at this movie Venom the way I look at Bayverse Transformers or the MCU. This is its own universe, it’s own unique take on the characters. It’s not meant to be my childhood reincarnated, it’s a totally new experience, that gives winks and nods to the past.

I think once more people can wrap their head around that concept, they’ll enjoy the movies more. In look, tone, and character, Venom is looking to be more accurate to the comics than Dark Knight was. It’s funny how fickle the geekdom is.

As for Tom Hardy, he can take the worst roles, with ridiculous limitations ... like Mad Max or Bane, and deliver an intriguing performance. Even if it’s just subtle jestures. I think he was the perfect choice for Venom. He really plays characters with a tick really well. Oscar worthy? No. But I think he was born for the role like Ryan Reynolds was born for Deadpool.

I say this not to be mean, just matter-of-factly, but could it just be that you like Venom so much you're overlooking any flaws the movie may have? 'Cause that dialog is just... Just awful...