This is one of those Marvel movies that is really more of a Sony movie which only revolves around the Spider-Man universe, a universe that is virtually separate from the MCU, for now at least. Yet this specific movie doesn't really have any direct references to Spider-Man other than the odd easter egg.
This is one of those Marvel characters that always seemed a bit silly to me. Why do you need a vampire in a world of superheroes? Surely having lots of superheroes is enough? The introduction of vampires always felt like an unnecessary genre crossover to me. To be clear, 'Blade' is in his own vampiric universe, but Morbius is within the Spider-Man universe, I just don't think he fits in. I don't think you need a vampire to be in Spidey's world, leave vampires for vampire flicks.
Another problem here is the origins story for Morbius is exactly the same as any other character, except he become a vampire. Morbius had a tough childhood suffering from a strange genetic (?) blood illness which saw him isolated away in hospital. There he did manage to befriend another boy his own age with the same illness. As an adult Morbius tries to uncover a cure for his illness by using vampire bat genres spliced with his own (unsure what this illness is supposed to do to him but he has to use crutches?). Lo and behold this turns him into a vampire, because OF COURSE IT DOES! He must then struggle to control his new vampiric urges to kill people and drink their blood (ugh!). But fear not, he manages to control it, embrace it, and be a good vampire. Naturally his childhood friend (now super rich) eventually gets a hold of this prototype cure, uses it, and also becomes a vampire...but a bad one (ugh!!).
Yeah so the plot is completely and utterly the same crapola we've all seen a shitzillion times before, simply replace the superpower. The thing is director Daniel Espinosa decided to take this movie in a more adult orientated direction (which Sony apparently allowed) and abandon the MCU tomfoolery. A wise choice? Well judging by the box office no but in all fairness I was slightly surprised by this. I went in expecting this movie to be complete garbage due to fact it bombed but found myself thinking it was sort of okay, only just.
Don't get me wrong, this is not a good movie. The story is generic as hell. The movie has every superhero/vampire cliche in the book and follows a simple paint-by-numbers strategy. You know exactly what is going to happen, it's all fully predictable virtually right down to the dialogue. To make things worse the CGI special effects are very average, not terrible, but just entirely average. On the whole the movie is actually extremely dull both visually and generally. Most of the movie is taken up within clinical settings with Morbius being a scientist on the hunt for a cure. The rest of the movie is set within bleak boring night cityscapes/rooftops that offer no flare or anything dynamic considering this is a superhero flick.
The movie does actually do well with its adult horror angle though. This is the funny thing, had this been a low-budget, non-superhero based, vampire horror flick it might have done quite well. I could totally see something like this, with its solid cast, doing pretty well within the horror fanbase. Considering this is supposed to be a Spider-Man universe movie it's damn dark and foreboding. The horror aspect is ramped up pretty high with relatively intense sequences of action and vampirism. The fact you've got Jared Leto and Matt Smith both acting their hearts out for this silly Spider-Man spin-off movie also heightens everything to almost ridiculous levels of seriousness. Although the casting of Tyrese Gibson reminds you this is a stupid comicbook flick.
This is certainly a strange beast to be sure. It's a comicbook movie that certainly has all the regular comicbook tropes right down to a stupid nonsensical mid-credits scene. Every comicbook box has been well and truly ticked here. Yet at the same time the main star casting along with the director's dark adult approach gives us a somewhat unique comicbook movie that borders on (and looks like) a more grittier horror. And yet despite all that it's still quite bizarrely boring. I dunno, I didn't hate it, it was a reasonable vampire flick, don't judge me.
5/10
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