This news seems more-than-obvious that Sony Pictures executive Tom Rothman is reaching for lightning in a bottle just like what happened to Fox with DEADPOOL last month. VENOM is a logical choice for what is assumed to be Sony trying to jump on the the anti-hero bandwagon trend that has become prominent in Hollywood after the successes of GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY, DEADPOOL and most likely this summer's villain ensemble film SUICIDE SQUAD. Ironically, Rothman is the same guy who was one of the executives at Fox who Deadpool creator Rob Liefeld said kept DEADPOOL from getting greenlit for so long. In other words, this news about VENOM already feels wrong.
Tom Rothman single handedly kept Deadpool from getting made at Fox. Not a fan. Scratches Sony off the list....— robertliefeld (@robertliefeld) February 24, 2015
No disrespect to Harper because his VENOM script idea could be brilliant, however, this already feels off when you look at THR's report which states this new VENOM spin-off is not connected to the MCU reboot of Spider-Man, or the MCU at all. Talk about a wasted chance for a cool Venom origin integration in GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY VOL. 2 (please note: writer/director James Gunn has confirmed Venom is not in the sequel) or in the AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR films. Both have a presence in space which means the Venom symbiote could have easily gotten its intro.
Or maybe those things can still be in play in the MCU — albeit having two different movie universe Venom's could cause general audience confusion — and this new VENOM spin-off could be something where it's the anti-hero Agent Venom, who is Flash Thompson, as in the comics right now in a standalone franchise. Agent Venom is a little bit good and bad, similar to Deadpool. But again it has to be said that DEADPOOL was not greenlit sooner at Fox because of Rothman, who is now the chairman at Sony Pictures.
There's a lot of speculation in the last two paragraphs but the fact remains that it's still unknown what Sony is doing with VENOM because it hasn't even been written yet. Heck, let's speculate more and Marvel Studios could have heard this news through The Hollywood Reporter post and called Rothman to tell him there are already plans in place for Venom in the MCU and to squash a VENOM spin-off.
No matter how you look at this news it's not a good look for Sony who just saved face last year by partnering up with Marvel Studios for Spider-Man but could now lose all that good press by potentially ruining Venom... again.