Written by Matt Sazama And Burk Sharpless
Directed by Daniel Espinosa
Michael (to Martine): "I went from dying... to feeling more alive than ever. Increased strength and speed... the ability to use echolocation... and an overpowering urge to consume blood."
I finally got to the worst of the Spider-Man adjacent movies and yeah, it's reputation preceeded it. If there was an actor potentially incompatible with the comic book genre, it's Jared Leto.
From playing the worst live action iteration of the Joker in the now ended DC Extended Universe to going to playing a familiar Spider-Man antagonist. Well, anti-hero in this instance. Enter Michael Morbius.
We opened with a flashback to Michael's childhood in Greece being cared in a hospital by Nicholas (Jared Harris) while also bonding with a other kid named Lucien over their mutual blood illness. That bonding also included Lucien being called by Milo by Michael and Lucien embracing the new name foisted onto him by his "brother".
Cut to a quarter of a century later, a grown up Michael (Jared Leto) was working on a cure for their blood condition with Milo (Matt Smith) very much in his corner along with Martine Bancroft (Adria Arjona). However, the use of general splicing vampire bats came with consequences that Michael could've easily avoided.
Yes, Michael literally became Morbius, people died, he went to prison and Milo (who also went the same vampiric route) embraced the bloodlust. If Leto slept walked his way through this movie, Smith on the other hand completely embraced the sheer nonsense of the script and went with it.
Like the Venom movies, there's an incredibly messy third act with both brothers battling it out and Martine getting caught in the crossfire. As a love interest character, it's a thankless role for Arjona and the outcome for Morbius was basically the same as Eddie Brock's. However there might be a narrative point to that.
- This movie managed to flop twice for Sony and the second time was down to the company falsely believing the memes it generated would help save any losses.
- Matt Smith was originally announced to be playing Loxias Crown/Hunger. Milo does seem to be loosely based on the character.
- The mid credit scenes introduced Adrian Toomes (Michael Keaton) into this universe. He wasted no time in suiting up as Vulture and recruiting Morbius to his cause.
- Chronology: Twenty five years for both Michael and Milo, taking in Greece, New York and Costa Rica.
Morbius turned out to be as bad as expected. I wish I could say there was a guilty pleasure aspect to give it some glimmer of redemption, but it's crap, through and through. Leto's terrible and while Smith tried at least, it ain't enough to make me want to revisit this one anytime soon.
Rating: 4 out of 10
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