Critics SLAM Jared Leto's 'Morbius': 'Ludicrously pointless, sucks more than just blood'
Morbius, The Living Vampire was set to make his onscreen debut way back in 1998 as a part of Wesley Snipes' 'Blade'. Director Stephen Norrington made a cameo appearance but it didn't make the final cut and along with it, all future plans for a larger role in the sequel were slashed.
It would take more than two decades for the plans to be realized and it would be kickstarted by 'Venom' as a part of Sony's Spider-Man universe. Directed by Daniel Espinosa and written by Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless (The Last Witch Hunter), 'Morbius' is gearing up to release soon. The official synopsis of the Jared Leto-starrer reads, "Dangerously ill with a rare blood disorder and determined to save others suffering his same fate, Dr. Morbius attempts a desperate gamble. While at first it seems to be a radical success, a darkness inside him is unleashed. Will good override evil – or will Morbius succumb to his mysterious new urges?"
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The superhero flick is, however, being bashed by critics ahead of its release for its pointlessness, lackluster narrative, and rather monotonous execution. Calling 'Morbius' superpower as being "bafflingly dull", Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian went on to label the film as a "ludicrously pointless Jekyll and Hyde vampire-monster yarn" that was also "amazingly dumb". He even took jabs at the facial transitions that the fictional character makes when he transforms, finding it to be "intensely silly".
Kate Erbland of IndieWire described 'Morbius' as a "vampire superhero film that sucks more than blood," writing that "the film occupies a strange no-mans-land of the sprawling Spider-Verse, not charming like the 'Spider-Man' films, not funny like the 'Venom' films, and certainly not technically impressive like the animated 'Into the Spider-Verse'." She was also of the opinion that the CGI used to show the transformation was "ugly and unappealing".
"This is what now passes for a new Marvel chapter?" asks Owen Glieberman, in his review for Variety. He also found the teaser included in the credits to be the "worst closing" one he has ever seen in a Marvel movie. Glieberman also wondered whether there were any directorial notes during the production as he seemed to be of the opinion that "no one ever sent the script back for a rewrite with the instructions, “Please add a script.” As in: Add spice, add dialogue, add something so that the movie plays like more than a barely colored-in diagram."
Writing off 'Morbius' as a film that's "dead on arrival", Mason Downey of Gamespot felt that the film "never manages to get off the ground." Calling the titular character a "D-list Marvel villain", Downey found the core conflict of the film to be "deeply generic" and "a repeat of the first Venom movie's broadest strokes minus the slapstick comedy and charm of Tom Hardy playing against himself." He ended his review by saying, "Sony doesn't actually know what made the original Venom garner such an unexpected cult following to begin with and desperately wants to recreate the same fluke twice."
The reviews continue to pour in but most of them, if not all, seem to be slamming the Espinosa directorial. Whether 'Morbius' is a box-office dud or not is something we're going to have to wait to find out but for now, the verdict, in the words of Matt Donato of IGN, is that it's "an origin story that lacks fangs and bite."
'Morbius' is slated to release in cinemas on April 1, 2022.