Reese and Wernick on the Venom Spin-Off

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Reese and Wernick on the Venom Spin-Off

Source:Edward Douglas

April 9, 2009

A few weeks back, ComingSoon.net/Superhero Hype! had the privilege of visiting the set of Sony's upcoming horror comedy Zombieland, starring Woody Harrelson, Jesse Eisenberg, Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin. While we can't talk just yet about what we saw, we did get to spend a good 45 minutes with the film's co-writers and executive producers, Rhett Reese and Paul Wernick, both cool guys who are clearly fans of genre. With that in mind, it was exciting to know they were working on the first draft for Sony's planned "Spider-Man" spin-off movie Venom, and we had to try to get in a few questions about that.

The duo actually went to Sony with a pitch for their take for the popular Spidey villain, but couldn't really say too much about it due to the usual non-disclosure agreements anyone involved with such a high profile project for Marvel would probably have to sign.

"Venom is something that we're very fired up to be writing," Reese told us. "We have turned in a draft and are waiting to hear back, so it's early in the process. But it's a thrill to be writing 'Venom' for obvious reasons."

As far as what Marvel is looking for, Reese did say that they had to follow "certain parameters" or the "47 rules" as Wernick called them.

"Obviously, with a character like Venom there's a ton of stuff to draw from," Reese told us. "Then they had specific rules about the villain and the backstory and stuff like that, so there were certain things they wanted us... certain parameters they gave us. But largely we pitched them something and they liked it but they had changes, so we worked on the outline for a long time and then we wrote the script. So with Marvel and Sony and us it's definitely very, very collaborative."

They couldn't talk about whether they were going to ignore everything that happened with the character in Spider-Man 3 or start fresh for reasons mentioned above.

They're also working on a project with Universal called Earth vs. Moon, which also sounds like an exciting idea for a film. Reese told us a little bit more:

"It's a science-fiction epic war movie ala, I don't know, 'Braveheart.' It's sort of got a little 'Star Wars' in it, a little 'Braveheart,' a little '300' in it. It's like it's sort of exactly what the title suggests. It's big and crazy and it's gonna be awesome. It's a colony on the moon, and the colony on the moon is fighting Earth. We're very, very excited about it. We've also turned in a draft on that and are waiting to hear back, so we're in early stages on each of those."

Look for more about our visit to the set of Zombieland over on ComingSoon.net and ShockTillYouDrop.com sometime in the near future.

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Posted by: hypestyle on April 9, 2009 at 11:35:05

booo, hisss.... no venom movie for me..

Posted by: mikeinoh on April 9, 2009 at 11:38:33

This is a terrible idea. Even comic writers can't come up with a decent backstory for Venom. He's a slobbering monster that works cool when Marvel needs to sell some Spidey books. Terrible idea on the big screen.

Posted by: mcooper on April 9, 2009 at 11:40:03

i'm okay with venom as long as they go dark dark darkkkkk, and take out whats his face who played him in spidey 3. earth vs. moon sounds interesting....

Posted by: Vance Astro on April 9, 2009 at 11:41:29

mikeinoh, the rumor is that the story is based on the mini where they take the suit from Brock and store it in a prison in Alaska to experiment on it, and then it gets loose and goes all John-Carpenter's-the-Thing on everybody's a$$, eventually bustin out Brock.

Maybe their research could invent Carnage.

Posted by: Climie on April 9, 2009 at 11:47:16

I Hope this movie is gonna work, Venom is the coolest marvel character on earth (guess they dont have Marvel on the moon)
but i prefer venom BACK in Sm4...
so i hope the venom movie will go about HOW he comes back...butt w;ll see

sorry, im from holland, writing issent very good

Posted by: Brian on April 9, 2009 at 11:47:48

Am I the only one who has realized that as long as a comic book title exists anywhere, movie companies are gonna keep making these damn things because they know its a gold mind?

Posted by: theMan on April 9, 2009 at 11:47:49

This might be a good thing, just too early to really comment on. But I do love venom,not that skinning one but the one in the comics

Posted by: A sshole of A ssholes on April 9, 2009 at 11:48:14

Mixed feelings...

Posted by: GrifferCJN on April 9, 2009 at 11:48:38

Please just let it go!!! If they screw this up like spidey3 people are gonnasnap and there will be riots and massacres!! It will bring the end of the world!!!

Posted by: DannyRand on April 9, 2009 at 11:54:03

Abigail Breslin, the cutest kid in hollywood, is in a Zombie movie? Little Miss Sunshine blowing some shuffler heads off sounds cool in my book!

Posted by: IronFan72 on April 9, 2009 at 11:54:39

What a complete waste, Venom had a less than impressive screen time in Spider-man 3, now they want to give him hid own film, after that abomination, I think not.

Posted by: Rick Barnswallow on April 9, 2009 at 11:55:29

I never understood a movie based solely on a villain. Unless it is a horror franchise. And Venom wasn't really a horror character, despite how he looks. Venom is just a 90's villain. People need to stop having such a hard-on for the character and we can focus on characters that are actually plausible. No more Venom. No more Sandman.

Posted by: batfan on April 9, 2009 at 11:58:04

This is gonna be a tough one ...

On the one hand, if they start from scratch and ignore Spider-Man 3, I'm gonna hate it just for that, because Marvel is a universe and they should try to do that for movies as well as far as it's possible (and since both are Fox movies, it would be possible).
But on the other hand, Brock pretty much died at the end of Sider-Man 3 ...

Posted by: fuad_ramses on April 9, 2009 at 12:00:09

I'd rather they keep him in his own crappy movies that I don't have to go see. No more inflicting him or any vestige of the alien symbiote into any other Spider-Man movies. Let the Venom fanboys get their rocks off on this, and the normal Spider-Man fans can continue to enjoy their movies unscrewed-up

Posted by: Batzarro http://bestgeekeverpr.blogspot.com/ on April 9, 2009 at 12:05:27

Cast Vin Dieasel, Sony. That is all. Even he's said he'd like to play a villain that has his own film!

Posted by: Karl Marx on April 9, 2009 at 12:07:40

Unless they go blood and guts horror movie I don't see the point.

Posted by: Jeramy PBF Studios RedbeardsBooty.blogspot.com on April 9, 2009 at 12:08:19

This could be a very good thing, let's hope they don't screw it up.

Posted by: the_jon_boy on April 9, 2009 at 12:08:55

is there gonna be any spider-man reference in it? if no, how are they gonna tell the origin story? Venoms movie is really gonna be a hard sell if they give him a different origin and ignore the spider-man stuff. I say he doesnt have to be a villian remember the lethal protector stuff and he should fight carnage.

Posted by: Vance Astro on April 9, 2009 at 12:19:18

Venom isn't always a villain. It's the symbiote that twists people into acting murderous. I doubt this will be a reboot of the character. They'll probably kick it off with the government securing the symbiote after the last Spidey film.
Topher Grace is much older now and a little heavier, so i don't see a need to recast the part of Brock.

Posted by: Syn on April 9, 2009 at 12:19:32

BTW just watched Spidey 3 again, and I didn't notice it the first time around but venom didn't all die, Dr. Conners still has part of venom that is well and alive. Although Brock is dead.

Posted by: What on April 9, 2009 at 12:24:01

Venom does not deserve a spin-off movie, they should just make him the villain for SpiderMan 4 & just do it right this time. Make him the only villain. Why cant these movie companies just do things right!!!!!!

Posted by: Jman on April 9, 2009 at 12:24:16

How cool would it be if the told the spider-man/venom story from venom's point of view. I know that's not the way it would go down but if they did that it might help forget how bad spider-man 3 was.

Posted by: Big D on April 9, 2009 at 12:27:02

They should at least hold off if they're gonna do it at all. I'd hate to see them contradict the spider-man franchise by having a different Brock and a different origin...but how could they really do it otherwise. I think Topher was actually a really good idea for Brock and he played it well...he just wasn't given enough material to work with because everything else they had crammed into the plot.

Posted by: m00man25 on April 9, 2009 at 12:29:20

As a huge Venom fan I'm a little weary of a Venom Movie. It's almost impossible to do it correctly without Spider-Man or Eddie Brock cause the whole reason the symbiote chooses Brock his because of his hatred for Parker. If they do some BS where the symbiote is the focal point and jumps from host to host then it would be some lame a$$ horror movie. I don't know I really wish Sony didn 't have the reigns on this one.

Posted by: Shayera on April 9, 2009 at 12:31:30

Someone new should definately take over. Topher Grace didn't take the role seriously.... he may as well have been Eric Foreman again. I wouldn't pour any expectation into this, and then come out pleasantly surprised. That said, I think the coolest way to go would be to make a Predator style Venom movie. Everyone wants to see a lot of Venom, but I think the more you see, the less scary he becomes.
Spider-man 3 needs to be completely disregarded. If they were to try to keep up with the continuity, they'd get nowhere fast... unless they want to make a movie taking place between the half-hour (movie time) that Eddie gets the symbiote and the construction site sequence. But that would be retarded.

They really ought to cast a heavy weight. Venom doesn't require an A-lister or a B-lister. Hell, Dwayne Johnson would be perfect.

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