'Venom'

Regarding Venom and Sony's decisions:

First off, ignore the critics and just see the movie. It was a fun ride that I got to see for free, but would happily pay to see again. One of the critiques people have is that it's not "violent enough" and that the movie settled to a PG-13 rating after being teased for over a year it would be rated R.

After much thought, I'm actually glad they toned it down. The violence is there, no question, but the thing it lacks that I'm actually grateful for is gore. You watch Venom eat a guy's head on a few occasions, but the movie doesn't go to unnecessary lengths to show it. I think people are just salty the movie didn't turn out to be another gore-porn-horror-flick and I'm actually really happy Sony did that.

Truth be told, it actually took me back to the classic 90s animated series where Carnage made his debut and Venom was a consistent antagonist. There was never any gore, limb-tearing, or even head-eating but you could tell from the get-go that Carnage and Venom were bad news and, as a child, they were scary.

A lot of people are worried that Carnage is going to be the next villain and that Sony won't make it rated R. At first, I was in agreement with this: how do you appropriately show a psychotic serial-murderer with superpowers named CARNAGE without the actual carnage, right? The guy's very name lends itself to violence of the R-rated nature.

Sony responded to this by basically saying they wanted to display more of Kasady's psychosis and demented motives than they did the gorey, gruesome bits. They said you can show violence without the unnecessary grotesque imagery. While Kasady does have a seriously troubled past (to say the least), I actually think they can do it proper justice without Deadpool/Logan/SAW levels of gore.

This may be a cop-out to avoid making an R-Rated franchise in the hopes of future collaboration with Spider-Man, but I actually think, if they're being honest about this, it's a GOOD decision. Yes, Sony admitted they wanted that cross-over down the road, and I am quite worried that they're looking too far ahead without finishing whats on their plate.

What the horror genre lacks these days, however, is genuinely terrifying characters. It's all jump-scares and gore-porn and I honestly can't stand it. If Sony actually plans to tell a GOOD story and portray Carnage the RIGHT way, while still showing him to be obsessively violent, and can do it without gore-porn I'm all aboard!

I've been incredibly bored with the Conjuring movies, Insidious sequels/prequels, and most of the other big-screen adaptations of horror. To be honest, I found more terror in small-screen YouTube series like the Look-See than I ever have in theaters.

Even more so, I was more scared of Riot in the Venom movie as an antagonist than I was of The Nun. Seriously, Hollywood really needs to learn that an upside down cross isn't scary, or satanic/demonic. It's actually called a St. Peter's cross, but that's another rant for another time.

Seriously though, the movie is worth watching and I'm probably gonna buy it. It's more than just a fun-action-flick, it was a genuinely good movie. Go watch it, give it your own criticism. Entertainment is absolutely subjective, and I for one loved this movie. That's coming from a long time Spider-Man/Venom fan too.