Marvel and Sony released a new Kraven the Hunter trailer with Aaron taylor-johnson’s new Kraven. It is part of all the Spider-Man spinoff movies that Sony is developing in the Venom verse. This is located in Venom’s universe, along with the Morbius movie. Pretty much any other movie they are doing, like the Madame Web movie, will also be located in this universe as well.
There are a lot of Spider-Man references in here, but not quite as crazy as in the Morbius trailer. So I don’t think they’re going to be cutting a ton of Spider-Man stuff out of this between the trailer and the actual release later this year.
But it will be interesting to see how they tie all this Spider-Man-related stuff in references into this and how they tie it to the Venom movies as well. Probably some kind of crazy post-credits scene.
There are a couple of Big Spider-Man villains in this, too, as you probably noticed, like the Rhino, for example. So we’ll just start at the beginning of the trailer and work our way through, shot by shot, talking about Easter eggs and WTF moments and how this is connected to all of the Spider-Man movies.
Kraven The Hunter Movie Release Date
Kraven The Hunter movie will be released on 6 October 2023. Well, it was originally going to release on 13 January 2023, and like all of Sony’s Spider-Man-related movies, it was also delayed.
Kraven The Hunter trailer started with Kraven as an adult, getting ready to go after a car standing on the ledge. You notice he’s running through traffic barefoot. He does have low-level powers. Like, think of Captain America, super soldier-level powers. Not quite as strong as someone like Spider-Man, for example, but way stronger than a normal human.
Probably one of the other big reveals of the trailer is that Russell Crowe, of all people, is playing his father. Did not expect Russell Crowe to show up in a Sony Spider-Man-related movie. Part of the idea in the trailer is that he’s training them to be as hardcore as he is. Like he has this philosophy, he talks about their mother, which is a bit of a comic book reference. Kraven’s mother went insane, and his father put her in an asylum.
During the full red band version of the trailer, they actually discussed that. Like you see what seems like their chateau as they talk about their mother being sent to an asylum and going insane. It sounds like, based on the way they talk about her in the trailer, she went to the asylum and died there, and that’s why they’re pissed off at their father. But that’s part of the idea.
So the whole idea is that what Russell Crowe, as his father, does seems way, way worse. And probably the main antagonist of the movie, if not the Rhino.
Kraven The Hunter’s Origin
All the different crews that Kraven’s taking down, all these different people sound like they’re associated with his father because he’s talking to his brother, the Chameleon; he says, “Our father put all this evil in the world. I’m trying to take it out of the world.” Sounds like he’s going after all of his father’s people, and the Rhino is one of those people.
Like you see when he’s a young boy here, when Kraven is getting his powers, his origin story, you see the Rhino character before he becomes the Rhino standing next to his father. You see them down in Africa hunting big game. His father is trying to teach him how to hunt as a boy.
Then the way they’re explaining his powers, his origin story here, is that he somehow bonds with the animal. The animal DNA bonds with his DNA, as opposed to the comics, where it was more of a potion that he took that, gave him his powers. Like he’s hunting this lion, it almost fails, and it almost kills him. But then, somehow, he bonds with his blood, and that gives him his connection to animals. His animal-like powers, so to speak.
You kind of get the reference here, like he was bitten. Like Spider-Man was bitten, got the spider bite, and they gave him his powers. Kraven was bitten by the lion and got his powers from the lion bite, so to speak.
Later in the timeline, you see the Rhino character before he’s become the Rhino asking about this quote-unquote hunter. So it sounds like he doesn’t know what’s going on with Kraven yet. But it sounds like he’s somehow associated with Kraven’s father.
So it’s this whole idea that Kraven’s going after all of his father’s people, but his father’s people, like the Rhino, don’t quite know what’s going on at first. “This mystery badass with all kinds of crazy powers is coming after all of us. Who is it? Oh, it’s right. It’s your son”.
Will Kraven Movie Be Rated R?
Then we have this scene which is part of the footage that they showed off at Cinemacon earlier. The version they showed off at Cinemacon was like the R-rated Red Band version. It was way more hardcore. He winds up biting one of these dudes’ noses and often uses a trap, a real medieval-looking old-school trap, on another one.
They’re basically solely introducing more villain movies. This is going to be rated R, so there is a Red Band trailer. There’s so much stuff to talk about in this trailer. Like you can make all the jokes you want, it’s Morbin Time; it’s Kraven Time.
I do think the idea that they’re going to let this be rated R like Venom and, Venom Let there be Carnage should have been rated R. Makes me a lot more hopeful for this Kraven the Hunter movie than, say, for like Morbius.
There was an image of him in the vest earlier that leaked that people were really crazy about. We’ll see what it actually looks like when we see him running around in this.
Later in the trailer, he does get a comic book-accurate version of the costume. So they are showing it in the trailer, so he does eventually look a little more accurate. The claw he wears around his neck on the necklace is meant to be from the lion that almost killed him and gave him his powers. Looks like he got super ripped for this role.
Calypso With Kraven
Then there is Calypso, who’s a long-time Kraven associate in the comics; she’s a voodoo priestess. It also kind of drives his hatred of Spider-Man with a lot of her magic powers. Then there is another version of the Rhino later in the timeline, seemingly before he’s become the Rhino.
It seems like Kraven’s still talking to Calypso when he says, “he’s taking the evil that his father put in the world out”, as he’s taking this Rhino’s crew out.
It’s not really clear what kind of organization his father runs. During the comics, Kraven’s family were former aristocrats. They might be saying their backstory in the movie is that they used to be former aristocrats, and their father runs this evil international organization that is slowly dismantling.
Part of the idea with his tragic back story is that his family came from wealth and power, but that slowly weight, like their family lost their wealth.
Is Chameleon In The Kraven Movie?
You see Kraven arguing with his brother, who is playing the Chameleon from the comics, about how bad their father is. “You’re turning into our father,” basically, which is a very common trope of these father-son superhero stories, even for villain origin stories too. They’re trying to position Kraven in the trailer as more of an anti-hero type of character, the same way they did with the Venom character.
Talking to a version of the Chameleon. It’ll be interesting to see if he also becomes the chameleon during the course of this movie too. He gets his origin story as well. I remember when Spider-Man Far From Home came out, that mystery character, people thought that he was going to be the Chameleon so much. There were so many fan theories about this. He just turned out to be a random dude.
When Kraven’s an adult, he goes up against his father. We will see if that’s going to be one of the big final battles of the movie. They’re hyping up this Rhino fight like it’s going to be a big thing, too. So the rhino might wind up being the actual final Villain.
Spider-Man Reference
Love all the spiders, obvious spider, Spider-Man reference. Part of the idea is that he absolutely hates, he hates spiders. So then he meets Spider-Man, and that drives his hatred of him further. One of the reasons why he’s sort of fighting Spider-Man initially is because he is searching for another challenge.
I think they’re trying to give more of a basis in reality in the movie. Like if he eventually does go after Spider-Man with a version of the Sinister Six that assembles, they’re trying to create a better reason for that within this Venom universe. But we’re still kind of wondering who that Spider-Man is going to wind up being. Will it be Tom Holland’s Spider-Man? Will it be Andrew Garfield Spider-Man or Amazing Spider-Man?
I did a bunch of articles when Morbius came out because there were so many Easter eggs pointing to Andrew Garfield’s Amazing Spider-Man. And during Amazing Spider-Man 2, there were a lot of things that were meant to set up a lot of the stuff that they’re doing now in the live-action movies. Like if have they done Amazing Spider-Man 3 and their original Sinister Six spin-off movie that they planned on doing, they would have been doing this stuff years ago.
One of the funny things here, though, is it seems like he’s being engulfed by spiders. I think they might make him terrified or just really pissed off when he thinks of spiders in the future. Just that kind of funny thinking about it that way. “Oh, it’s not you, Peter Parker. He doesn’t hate you; he just hates spiders”. So any time you put the mask on, he’s really going to hate your guts.
A good way to think about this is like an Indiana Jones versus Snakes kind of situation. Like a very bad quote-unquote encounter with a ton of spiders left him sour on spiders for the rest of his life.
Then Kraven puts on the comic book-accurate costume. And if it wasn’t clear, this is the lion’s mane that almost killed him, that he turned into this jacket basically. Tagline isn’t a comic book character; it’s just him as part of his father’s organization and some person that he comes to kill.
Is Rhino The Main Villain In The Kraven Movie?
Then they have the Rhino reveal, explaining that he’s going to be a biological version of the character, and they’ll use a serum to transform him into the Rhino. You got to let me know what you think of that. I’m sure there are going to be some people out there that were like, “I actually enjoyed Paul Giamatti’s version of the mechanical Rhino,” even though it was meant to be so comical and over-the-top.
I feel like whatever they do in this movie; they can only go up as you can only go up from that Paul Giamatti performance. Even Kevin Feige, when he gave notes on Amazing Spider-Man 2 when he was talking to Amy Pascal, like, “Here you should change a couple of things here. These parts of the movie work, these parts don’t work”. And they took some of his notes, not all of them.
One of his notes was that he was confused why they were trying to work in the Rhino stuff, “like, why are you using this Paul Giamatti rhino stuff? You should just cut that out”.
As you can imagine, they did not listen to him. They left the Rhino stuff in Amazing Spider-Man 2. But because they had that big Sinister Six teaser with The Vulture in the Morbius Post-Credits scene, I feel like we’re going to continue that theme in these post-credits scenes for the Kraven movie. They’ll be some scenes tying him to some of those characters, maybe not all of them, but at least one of the other characters.
One of the interesting details, though, is that in the trailer, you notice Kraven scratching names off the list. Don’t be surprised if he has Spider-Man or Venom or one of the other Sinister Six characters’ names on his list, like Morbius’ name on his list. So let me know if you think that’s how they’re going to tease him crossing over with Spider-Man or Venom or these other Sinister Six characters; that was seen as the logical way to do it.
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