Unique foundation, formulaic execution….

Sony’s Morbius should be seen as a sort of achievement, a statement that superhero films have become so mainstream and their main characters have been explored so much that we can start exploring interesting side characters and supervillains/anti-heroes. It’s this same state that brought us movies like Venom, and Sony clearly wants to recreate the specific magic it found with Venom with another Spider-Man associated character (yes, Morbius is a Spider-Man character). As such, Morbius feels a lot like the first Venom movie. Not in theme and setting, as Morbius is much darker, less humorous and has a basis with a more interesting moral quandary. But in the same way that the first Venom movie spent too much time trying to establish the overall world of the character and not enough time giving us an engaging story and character dynamics , Morbius falls into a lot of the same traps, feeling like a movie that had to get made so we meet a new (very) interesting  character, rather than one that Sony necessarily wanted to make because they had an amazing script they couldn’t wait to release to the public.

Staring Jarred Leto in the titular role as Doctor Michael Morbius, the film sees him, an accomplished doctor with a rare blood disorder that constantly requires a machine to keep him alive, come up with an experimental procedure to save himself and other people like him with the same disorder, said procedure of course turns him into a vampire-like superhuman, and now balancing between being a good man and giving into his more primal, beastly nature in order to survive becomes his main conflict. It’s a fairly basic premise but it is fleshed out in some very interesting ways, especially on the simple basis that unlike dozens of comic characters, Morbius’ vampiric nature makes his “tortured hero” arc a little more plausible. It’s one thing for Batman to be moody all the time just because, it’s another to feel guilty and moody because you know you want drain everyone in the room’s blood. This same moral dilemma stretches to those he loves as well, especially his best friend Milo and love interest Martine. Leto’s performance sells his inner turmoil well, even if sometimes it seems like Morbius is too much of a sad/self serious character.

His supporting cast balances well off of this well, especially Matt Smith’s Milo, who essentially plays the crazy to Morbius’ serious straight-man. It’s almost like the Thor-Loki dynamic where one is too serious and the other has fun creating mischievous schemes, and Smith makes Milo easily the most interesting character in every scene he’s in.  Aided by Tyrese Gibson’s Simon Stroud, and the second funniest person in this film in Al Madrigal’s Agent Rodriguez, and you have a cast that works well with what they’re given, even if it doesn’t always land as expected. Again , it’s not a case of none of it being interesting or engaging, but rather the film still spends more time trying to explain why Milo or Martine are important, rather than just letting the characters riff on each other and letting the audience pick up that their chemistry and bond is clearly a sign of how close they are.

The film thankfully doesn’t spend too much time trying to explain  the action scenes , and adds a stylistic element to them. Morbius’ ability to sense sounds is used very much as his most defining power, allowing everything from his ability to basically “see without seeing” to a way to watch over the streets of New York by listening to far off crimes and a lie detector. It also adds an aesthetic to the world around him that looks cool every time he triggers it. The only flaw to this is that when Morbius or other vampires move with their powers, the combined sonar effects and CGI effects of his movement don’t meld too well, and get a little confusing to say the least. This is probably why in some fights they cut to slow motion. It looks cool yes, but it’s basically so you actually know whats happening. There’s also some interesting, maybe not-so-accurate changes they make to Morbius’ powers which dependeing on how you lean towards the character, might be great or a little too much. Regardless though the action scenes are one of the better parts of this movie, and chances are you’ll love all of them.

Then there’s that world-building aspect. Now, before we continue, spoilers for Spider-Man: No Way home follow:

Chances are you saw the trailers that showed Michael Keaton’s Vulture in the film, aka the MCU version of vulture which isn’t where Morbius or Venom come from(who’s been confirmed to be in the same world as Morbuis). You can thank all of SpiderMan and Dr Strange’s shenanigans in No Way Home for changes this however, as while Venom and Morbius are still in their own world, it seems they’ll be pulling some other Spidey villains from other universes to form a team of their own sometime soon. Now while this concept is intriguing on its own, it seems Morbius spent time trying to build up a world for that to happen, along with of course building Morbius’s own story. This is again where the aspect of too much worldbuilding comes in, and hopefully it pays off in future in the same way similar problems payed off for Venom or the DCEU Justice League movies.

And that’s Morbius. It’s a movie with a solid foundation and a good character but it currently feels too driven to create a world around that character than actually get us interested in his personal dynamics. Again, this will likely improve in future installments. But right now this formulaic approach makes it an enjoyable movie that you can easily poke holes at. It’s still worth watching, but it does require you to temper some expectations.

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