Whether you’re one of the fans that enjoyed Sam Raimi’s ‘Spider-Man’ trilogy or not, there’s one thing on which I’m certain all Spidey fans will agree… the rendition of Venom in ‘Spider-Man 3’ was a horrible disappointment!

Well it appears that Marvel hasn’t given up on the character. When last we heard, there were rumors that ‘Chronicle’ director Josh Trank was being courted to make a stand-alone Venom movie. Since then, not much has been said. And by “not much”… I mean “nothing”.

In a recent interview with Crave Online, Marvel Studios CEO Avi Arad and producer Matthew Tolmach discussed the idea of the Venom movie, how it would fit into the larger Marvel universe, and even dropped a glimmer of hope for us Spider-Man fans.

It seems as if Marvel wants to give Venom his own stand-alone movie before turning him into a Spider-villain. Arad had this to say on the concept:

“As you know, Venom is defender of the innocent. The only guy he really, really hates is Peter Parker, Spider-Man. The reason you didn’t see more development on Venom in the comics is because this power that he was given, he knew who Peter was, he knew who Spider-Man was, so go kill him already. We always struggle with storylines and you see the new Venom books. It’s Flash in Iraq. We know that if we put him in a certain position and concentrate on the human, not on the creature, which I thought was a really good beginning in 3.”

Tomach added:

“The truth is he also deserves his own movie. We’ve been sitting around in a room talking about Venom stories and it’s a really full bodied complicated character, Eddie Brock and this character. Maybe people feel there wasn’t enough of a chance to unravel it, but we’re all in on him.”

So… a movie where Eddie Brock becomes Venom without having his origin tied to Spider-Man? I see how the symbiote angle could work but the whole idea of Venom’s creation was that he was inextricably linked back to Peter Parker / Spider-Man. If he doesn’t have that… is he still Venom?

And who would make the movie? If Arad is talking about it, it seems like Marvel Studios wants to make the film. Does that mean that Sony Pictures, who has the movie rights to Spider-Man, not also have the rights to Venom? Or is Marvel planning on making some deals with Sony so that the two studios could team up on something like this?

Speaking of Sony and Marvel Studios teaming up… Arad was asked about potentially crossing over the ‘Spider-Man’ and ‘Avengers’ film universes to allow Spider-Man back into his rightful place as an Avenger. Arad didn’t give a full committal, but he did suggest that…

“Everything is possible. If something like that happens, it’s great for Disney, it’s great for Sony. If the right story comes in, we are now working on Venom first. It’s our first out. So our thinking is in the right direction. Avengers to me was an expected success so I never looked at it because Avengers was successful.”

If (and that’s a big IF) Marvel and Sony can find a way to play nice, there’s lots of potential in both a Venom movie and a Spider-Man/Avengers cross-over. But, if it can’t be done correctly, I’d rather neither of those things happen.

What do you think? Can the Venom character be developed in a vacuum without ties to Spider-Man? What about Spidey in the Avengers? Is that something that you’d like to see? Comment below and let us know.