With the release ofKraven The Hunter, theSony Spider-Man Universeis likely done, sparking a wave of post-mortems from professional critics, casual audiences, and box office analysts. Originally envisioned as a way to expand the Spider-Man saga, Sony chose to build a franchise not around the money-making wall-crawler himself but around his supporting cast and villains, making some truly strange picks for its leads. Characters like Morbius appear to have little to do with superheroes at a glance. Meanwhile, Madame Web and Kraven’s stories are both so tightly entwined with Spidey that it makes no sense to have them without him, and Venom is a strange lead when tasked with being the universe’s premiere superhero rather than an antagonistic antihero. In short,the SSU never made sense from the outsetand only seemed to get worse as time went on.
The result is a franchise that will be remembered for a string of hilarious box office bombs and critical appeal that peaked with a rotten58% on Rotten Tomatoes(Venom: Let There Be Carnageachieves the dubious honor of best of the worst, apparently). While the higher end of the SSU are watchable films andeven worth a revisit if enjoyed with some friends, and the franchise even has some strengths over other competitors, it is ultimately undeniable that the series never managed to resonate with audiences, a problem that extends beyond pure quality. The characters in Sony’s Spider-Man Universe were created to play off of Spider-Man and thus needed to be adjusted to work on screen. Many of the adjustments Sony made were for the worse, but a few could have worked if the quality part of the equation had factored back in. While none of these protagonists resonated with audiences, some came closer than others, and there’s a world where this would-be franchise might’ve clicked.This list will rank every protagonist in the SSUbased on how engaging and interesting they are and how well of a job the actors portraying them did.
5Madame Web (Dakota Johnson)
‘Madame Web’ (2024)
Cassandra Web is a paramedic in New York City who begins developing powers of precognition and telepathy when a mysterious spider man (no hyphen) begins hunting her. That’s about all audiences learned aboutMadame Web’s storyline when it was released, and itsimultaneously makes the character overly complicated and bare bones. A film’s protagonist is not only the character that the audiences follow for the majority of its runtime but also the one who goes through an emotional change that affects their outlook on life. InMadame Web,Dakota Johnson’s Cassandra begins the film as sure, a bit snarky, and quippy with her coworkers but still a caring and devoted paramedic who is intent on saving lives.By the end of the film, she has developed powers and been physically changed via injuries but she is still that same driven protector. Never once is there a hiccup in Madame Web’s runtime that is focused on the story instead of the pure plot.
In the comics,Madame Web’s convoluted backstory and static nature were never a hindrance, as she played the role of wise mystic and mentor to the younger and more dynamic Spider-Man. When the web-slinger is removed from her story and replaced with three characters who are given nothing more to do than be damsels,Madame Web needs to be changed or expanded to carry an emotional arc. While Sony changes her backstory so thatshe is confusingly friends with Spider-Man’s Uncle Benand Mother Mary Parker, they do very little to characterize her further in any depth.Madame Webhas quickly becomeone of the worst movies of 2024due to its silly plot, poor acting, terrible dialogue and spotty special effects. Weirdly, however,Madame Web holds little room in the minds of her viewers. Outside of Dakota Johnson’s cringey dialogue or off-camera press comments trashing the film, Madame Web is shockingly the most boring part of the movie that bears her name.
Madame Web
4Sergei Kravinoff/Kraven (Aaron Taylor-Johnson)
‘Kraven the Hunter’ (2024)
The most recent and potentially final addition to Sony’s roster of antihero outcasts isAaron Taylor-Johnsonas Sergei Kravenoff, AKA Kraven the Hunter. One of the mostfamous members of Spider-Man’s rogues gallery, Kraven is a hulking bear of a man adorned in a skinned lion who uses his superhuman powers to hunt for sport and personal gain. In his film adaptation, Kraven is a fairly fit man adorned in a brown vest who uses a confusing set of powers to kill drug dealers and poachers. While changes certainly need to be made when adapting to screen, andKraven the Hunteris more willing to do so thanMadame Web,the wrong changes can risk losing exactly what made a character interesting, and this is the fate suffered by the film. Not helping this issue is the film’s lack of Spider-Man or a character to fill that role.Kraven’s rivalry with Spider-Manis one of his character’s defining traits. Without the over-dramatic self-assuredness that defines the character, Kraven is left feeling like a stock, stoic, action protagonist.
As far as actors in the SSU go,Kraven The Hunterhasone of the stronger lead performances by Aaron Taylor-Johnson, and performers likeRusell CroweandAriana Debosecertainly provide the leading man with a decent supporting cast to bounce off of. However, while the performances are stronger thanMadame Web’s, the actors in Kraven are still given shockingly little to work with. Kraven’s journey in his big screen debut is a tale of revenge as he seeks to take down his hunter father’s criminal empire. The resolution to this arc comes when, upon defeating the elder Kravinoff (andThe Rhino, who looks like aPower Rangersvillain), Kraven’s brother informs him that Sergei is the same as his father and disowns him because they are both hunters. Running a criminal empire and destroying one isn’t exactly equivalent, butKraven takes it to heart and dons a lion’s peltto symbolize…something. Unlike other SSU films,Kraven the Hunterat least has an idea of a journey for its protagonist, which is a step above other SSU films.
Kraven the Hunter
Watch in Theaters
3Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy)
‘Venom Trilogy’ (2018–2024)
While it may seem weird at a glance to split up the two components of Venom into separate portraits, the films themselves beg to differ.The Venom Trilogyhinges on the interplay and spurned mutual growth of both Eddie Brock and the alien. Sadly for lead actorTom Hardy, the human part of his dual performance isweaker and less memorable than his alien counterpart. When audiences first meet Eddie Brock, he is a disheveled reporter struggling to find a purpose in his life following a heartbreaking separation from his ex, Anne (Michelle Williams). After becoming bonded with the alien symbiote known as Venom, Brock finds an ally and friend and ultimately gets the support and motivation he needs to find a new purpose in life. As far as arcs go, it is simplistic, butHardy’s quirky and offbeat performancesells it well enough.
The problems with Eddie as a protagonist and character come from the fact that, after the firstVenomin 2018, he stalls in his development and becomes almostmore of a side character in the symbiote’s storythan a protagonist in his own right. By the timeVenom: The Last Dancecomes along, Eddie has very little to do outside of being the straight man to Venom’s quirky antics and asking about exposition. If you trimmed dialogue related to asking aboutxenophages, codices, Knull or other deep-cut Venom MacGuffinsfrom the script, the physical half of Tom Hardy’s performance would be much smaller. Still,Eddie Brock is a likable character who fans have grown to enjoythanks to his actors' offbeat and compelling performance and a story that places him front and center, even if only for a third of it.
2Morbius (Jared Leto)
‘Morbius’ (2024)
After the derision thatMorbiusreceived, it may be shocking to see him near the top of any list, even one that is only 5 entries long. However, while the movie features likely some of the worst plots, acting, directing, dialogue, anddancingin the entire SSU, it also weirdly has one of the most straightforward and complete character arcs. Dr. Michael Morbius (Jared Leto) begins the film as sick and impoverished, who longs to cure the rare blood disease possessed by himself and his childhood best friend (Matt Smith). After injecting himself with vampire bat serum, much to Michael’s astonishment, he gains vampiric strength and power alongside his cured disease, leading him to crave blood and slaughter several people.Morbiushas a very simple story of a man suddenly gifted great power who must learn to use it responsibly (kinda like some other Sony property), which isjuxtaposed by Matt Smith’s villainous turnas his character uses his powers for revenge and selfish gains. Morbius ultimately is forced to put down his friend and begins a new antiheroic life, accepting the responsibility that comes with his new form.
Morbius still has to deal with a few terrible mistakes, including a nonsensical post-credit scene and an awkward performance from Jared Leto. The lines he delivers can drown out the characters' straightforward arc, including terrible gems like “To bats this is lethal, to humans it’s deadly,” and “You wouldn’t like me when I’m hungry.” Despite these lethal (or deadly) mistakes, however,Morbiusstill has more of a clearer story than several other films in Sony’s Spider-Man Universe. This approach is likely helped by the factthat Morbius is less connected to Spider-Manthan Madame Web or Kraven and can have fewer web-slinger-sized gaps to fill in any story about him. Morbius could have probably been a standalone project had Sony not gone out of their way to remind audiences that Spider-Man was missing from the film. It would likely still have been a bad movie,but not historically so as it has become.
1Venom (Tom Hardy)
Venom is easily the best protagonist in Sony’s Spider-Man Universe, as his development from alien parasite to lethal protector is a complete, if not consistent, story that builds from film to film. Voiced by Tom Hardy, Venom is characterized as a curious, naive creature initially driven by little more than survival and hunger. Through his bond with Eddie Brock, Venom develops emotions and even empathy for some of Earth’s inhabitants. Unlike Eddie, however, this arc continues to grow beyond the first film. InVenom: Let There Be Carnage, Venom struggles with a concept of identity and his place as an outcast, and inVenom: The Last Dance, he completes his journey growing from an alien wanderer into a hero who sacrifices himself to protect not only Eddie but the world at large. Whilethe Venom movies are full of nonsensical scenes, outrageous dialogue, and questionable VFX,Venom and his consistently quirky arc did make an impact on audiencesmore than any other SSU protagonist.
Like most characters in the Sony Spider-Man Universe, Venom’s arc is altered due to the absence of the web-slinger. However, unlike Madame Web or Kraven,Venom survives this change surprisingly well. While the character’s distinctive spider symbol is absent from his design, and Venom’s original motivations of a rivalry with Spider-Man are gone, the films escape largely unscathed due to focusing on the relationship between Eddie and Venom rather than external factors.The Venom movies may not be critical darlings, but they are still definitively the best-rated in the SSU by a longshot, and much of that is owed to their ability to own their camp status and provide weird and memorable performances and setpieces. Venom may be far from perfect, but for better or for worse,the lethal protector is deserving of being the Sony Spider-Man Universe’s lasting legacy.
