Morbius – review

Sony’s Spider-Man-less (?) Spider-Man cinematic universe has just expanded with the latest comic book movie to descend upon cinemas, Morbius, which follows its titular character as he attempts to rid himself of a blood disease and inadvertently ends up turning himself into a vampire in the process, and, like Venom and Venom: Let There Be Carnage before it, I was not impressed by the latest addition to Sony’s big screen Spider-Man character world.

Despite starting promisingly enough by showcasing a visually arresting title sequence complemented by a terrifically stirring theme tune and subsequently transitioning into a delightfully atmospheric and intriguingly enigmatic opening scene, Morbius quickly becomes a very vanilla, disappointingly tame and remarkably unoriginal horror-less vampire movie that, even though it’s about an individual who finds himself craving human blood, barely even features a drop of blood as it unfolds and constantly feels like it desperately wants to be an R-rated comic book horror movie, but is forbidden from being what it wants to be, presumably so that a wider age range can go see it, but its failure to capitalise on what could have been a fascinating premise by fully embracing the horror genre makes it frustrating to watch at times, particularly during the very few and very forgettable action sequences that it contains, which imply violence and gore without actually being violent and gory, and, like the movie as a whole, said action sequences would undoubtedly have been better if they were R-rated.

As for Morbius’s cast and characters, Jared Leto and Matt Smith do the best they can with what they’re given, and neither deliver bad performances as the movie’s titular character and his best friend, Milo, respectively, but what they’re given isn’t very memorable, and even though both characters’ motivations are made clear and understandable, their relationship arc is the very definition of clichéd and incredibly predictable. The rest of Morbius’s cast members also do the best they can with what they’re given and don’t deliver bad performances either, but while the material that Leto and Smith are given isn’t very memorable, what the rest of the cast is given is completely forgettable, as are, consequently, their characters, and I don’t feel the need or desire to comment further on them as a result.
All things considered, Morbius isn’t unwatchabale nor is it the worst comic book movie ever made. It just shies away from taking the opportunity to stand out by embracing the potentially unique and enthralling comic book horror possibilities that its protagonist’s story presents, and squanders a talented cast that definitely had a lot of potential to make a mark on the comic book movie genre by wasting them in a largely bland, very unimpactful and highly unoriginal non-horror vampire movie that is the cinematic embodiment of the word forgettable.

Rating: 4/10.

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