Before I go further, I’m going to provide links to the two best credits scenes there ever were. The first is for Iron Man, the second for Split.
The Iron Man will be primarily referenced throughout this writing but a reference to the Split sequence will be imbedded as well.
I watched the credits scene for Venom before I saw the movie itself; it leaked online and I was curious to see how Woody Harrelson’s wig looked in action (I saw a leaked picture of what he looked like before I saw the leaked footage of the credits scene which I saw before the movie.
I liked the movie btw. It’s not very good but Hardy escalates it in a way that I haven’t seen a lead escalate a movie in quite some time.)
As expected, it introduced Woody Harrelson as Cletus Kasady, otherwise known as Carnage. Fans predicted the actor would be taking the part the moment rumors about his casting arose and those predictions were only cemented when he confirmed he’s “just in a little fraction of the movie, but I’ll be in the next one.”
The scene itself is two minutes. And it is a very bad two minutes. It has very bad dialogue and very bad filmmaking. And this is a shame, because while I’m not a comic aficionado, I know Cletus/Carnage has a sizable following, and I’m sure the people awaiting his cinematic experience would have wanted something more….
….cinematic.
The scene goes as follows; we get a wide shot pushing in on a prison. We then get…another wide shot of the prison, this time circling around it with a motorcycle riding towards the entrance. We overhear Eddie speaking to the symbiote, with Eddie informing the symbiote that he has to keep quiet until he’s done with the interview.
We then get a shot of a prison door leading down a hallway opening. Eddie and a guard walk through. This exchange follows:
Guard: “You ask me, they’re dumb to let him call the shots. The second he asked for your to interview him, I’d shut that shit down.”
Eddie: “Well, you know the FBI. They’re just taking advantage of the only time he’ll ever speak to anyone one on one. They’re hoping I might help identify some additional bodies.”
Guard: “FBI don’t work up close and personal with him. The FBI will have to identify YOU if you don’t follow the rules!”
……….30 seconds into this and already a few problems have arisen.
They’re trying to build up that this is a dangerous guy Eddie’s gonna be talking to with a limited amount of screen time. So I get it; they don’t have a full movie to build him up properly. Using dialogue to build him up is, you know, fine too!
But none of this build up effectively conveys that Kasady is dangerous. Not in any meaningful way. Sure, the general concept behind the dialogue is fine; the guard expresses disapproval of anyone talking to him because he’s dangerous and insane. Eddie responds with a justification that also, in fact, establishes that he’s dangerous and insane. The guy has killed so many people that the FBI is A. after him and B. DOESN’T EVEN HAVE A FIXED COUNT ON HOW MANY PEOPLE HE’S KILLED.
But it doesn’t work dramatically. You have two guys walking down a hallway as a build up to meeting a dangerous serial killer. This is even putting aside Kasady’s place as one of Brock/Venom’s most famous enemies; it’s being conveyed in a casual conversation with some employee down a semi eerily lit hallway.
Not even a particularly frightening hallway. We don’t even get the ol’ “showing a bunch of different scary murderers in generic prison cells so when we get to the more protected prison cell we’re wondering why this guy needs a more protected cell.”
It’s just a semi dimly lit hallway.
(Worth noting; my proposal of showing other murderers to juxtapose Kasady with is not the direction I think they should have gone. More on that later.)
I’m not against using simplicity to set up big reveals. I’m not even against it in credits scenes; at their core they’re about as simple as you can get. They’re “setting up” a movie but they’re not like a trailer where they have the entire movie to choose from exciting footage and create a separate work of art that is entirely centered around anticipation for the movie. With the credits scene, you have two minutes or less to write a scene that dramatically functions in relation to the movie that just happened. They require simplicity.
But simple doesn’t have to be this stupid or….boring.
Let’s look back at Iron Man’s credits scene; it’s arguably the most iconic comic book credits scene since the creation of the concept. The set up for the Avengers is accomplished with great anticipation with two guys briefly talking in a living room.
But what’s the set up for the Iron Man scene? Firstly, we’ve had the previous two hours to appreciate just how rich and powerful Tony is. Jarvis is essential to this; he’s an AI who helps run his company.
When Tony walks into his home, Jarvis welcomes him home and his voice dies down. This grabs our interest; the technology of the superhero billionaire we just spent the entire movie following has been overridden! We’re wondering what’s happening!
This is one 9 second shot and it’s already done better set-up than the roughly 6 shots and 37 seconds we’ve seen so far.
Eddie is then taken through the first of what appear to be 3 other barriers separating our killer from the rest of the world. Another is a gate that the guard lets Eddie through, and Kasady is in a cage.
The closest thing to secrecy we get regarding Kasady is a shot of the words WELCOME EDDIE written in blood on a wall. Also in the shot are his legs.
The movie then cuts to a close-up of Kasady (whose hair they really, really should have thought out more).
I’m not going to get into a shot-by-shot analysis of what awaits us, and with the exception of the last line (which, don’t worry, I will get into), the dialogue is mostly fine. Kasady talks about what they might talk about, makes some comment about a particular blood splatter, and asks Brock to walk closer so he can be in more visible light. (There’s still enough distance between Brock and Kasady for physical proximity to not be a factor here).
The first problem with the rest of this scene (excluding the last line, which is a special kind of awful all by itself) is simple;
There are too many shots of Kasady’s face.
From the first close-up to the last, we see his ugly mug far, far too often. The direction makes no effort to conceal him, to make his presence frightening or mysterious. The first shot of his face has literally no impact (excluding whatever response you might have to his wig; Simpsons fans, for example, may be under the impression that Sony is actually building up to a live action Simpsons crossover starting with Sideshow Bob).
It just proudly shows us his face. Contrast this with the respective reveals in Iron Man and Split. In Iron Man, yes, we hear Fury talk, but it isn’t until the first of his two reveals that we see his face, the first reveal being the “holy shit it’s Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury!” reveal and the “holy shit they’re gonna make an Avengers movie!” reveal. Split takes its sweet time vaguely referencing its prequel Unbreakable, this reference being cemented by the push-in on none other than David Dunn in one shot.
The Venom scene, on the other hand, just flaunts Kasady’s face around. No discretion, no interest in impact, just “oh, Woody Harrelson’s in the scene now, let’s show his face and the ugly wig that’s attached to it.”
But, of course, there has to be a big “OOOOOOOHHHHHHHHH MMMMMMAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNN” moment at the end of this scene. It is a credits scene, after all.
And the scene certainly……….tries.
On the last close-up of Kasady, he says;
“When I get out of here…
…and I will get out of here…
…there’s gonna be carnage.”
He then smiles.
Cut to black.
…..now, let’s review.
The line is terrible enough as it is but there’s just…no build up to it whatsoever. Nothing. Brock walks into more revealing light as requested, and then Kasady has his “OOOOOOOHHHHHHHHH MMMMMMAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNN” moment.
Really, from start to finish, this entire scene takes little to no advantage of the dramatic opportunities present.
Now here’s an alternate take on how this scene could have been handled that does take advantage of the dramatic opportunities present.
The movie can keep its two wide shots of the prison. Maybe cut out Brock and Venom’s dialogue, maybe not; it’s whatever.
Then we cut to a brief scene between Brock and the warden or whatever in some office inside the prison. I’m not going to provide an exact script of what should be said in this scene that will never exist, only an overview of the information and character dynamics that should be conveyed.
The information that should be kept is that Brock is the first person Kasady has openly spoken to one on one since being arrested and that the FBI is aware of it and is hoping to get information from him. Have Brock be aware of both of these things, and have him be excited by this. This is a big break for him and he thinks he can help the good guys. Win-win.
Also important is to use the warden to, oh I don’t know, establish how dangerous he is. Have him briefly try and convince him to get out of it; it’s a credits scene so it can’t go on too long so maybe with an intense look on his face he asks “and there’s nothing I can do to talk you out of this.”
….WAIT
I’VE GOT IT
First shot in the office is a shot of the warden, he very bluntly asks “there’s nothing I can do to talk you out of this.”
Cut to a shot of Brock making a (reasonably) enthusiastic case for why this is a good thing.
Cut back to the warden.
“And there’s nothing I can do to talk you out of this.”
Cut to the door opening to Kasady’s cell. Keep the shot with his welcoming message. Keep his dialogue for all I care. Give him some physical presence, but don’t have him look at Brock (yet)
And don’t
I REPEAT
DON’T
Show his face until the last moment
Save the close-up and the creepy smile until the last possible moment.
Now, to lead into what this last moment is, we’re gonna have to really get into why that last line is so bad.
The problem with the last line of dialogue (besides there being no build-up) is how absolutely abysmal it is at appropriately setting up the character in question. He’s more or less just saying “I’m gonna do bad stuff when I get out of here”, and using the word “carnage” is too stupid and on the nose.
So what would have been better?
Once again, do what Iron Man and Split did and go for a more subtle name reveal.
Imagine if, during the Split credits scene, after saying “Mr. Glass”, Dunn got up to leave….only to turn to the camera and finish the movie with:
“I heard the guy that took him down was….unbreakable.”
This thankfully does not happen, he just says Mr. Glass’ name to establish the tie in.
Also imagine, if you will, that during the Iron Man credits scene, after Fury reveals his name, he says “I’ve got some friends who’d like to see if you’re interested in………avenging.”
No, he introduces himself, and he cites The Avengers in a way that’s simple, effective, and honest. They get you excited about The Avengers by, in fact, citing them, but it’s not some moronic pun. He’s a government guy, talking about a government initiative, so you use both of these simple things by referring to The Avengers as a government initiative. It gets the name across in a way that’s dramatically appropriate to what we’re talking about, gets fanboys excited, scene’s done.
So how could they have done this with Venom?
Have the “OOOOOOOHHHHHHHHH MMMMMMAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNN” moment be the reveal of Cletus’ name. Don’t tell me “oh well that might not reveal to everyone who he is!” Anyone that liked the movie that doesn’t know what the credits scene means is going to be googling or asking their slightly more knowledgable friends who that was. M. Night Shyamalan embraced the fact that the teenage-opening-night-horror-crowd seeing Split opening night wouldn’t know who Bruce Willis’ character was so he thought it’d spread some effective word of mouth with these teenagers finding out through research.
The same can be said of the few people seeing Venom who don’t know who Carnage is.
So end the scene as follows (generally speaking)
When Eddie walks into the light, have him take out a recording device (he is here for an interview after all) and have Eddie say something to get his name out. This shouldn’t be hard; here’s here for an interview, go with something like;
“Would you like to introduce yourself?”
THEN
Have an empty frame and have Cletus’ head enter it with that creepy smile, and just have him say;
“Cletus.”
*cut to black*
devilsadvocritic 