The cinematic experience of watching “Venom” can be likened to the unsuccessful fusion of the symbiote with many of the film’s victims: bones break, bodies contort and the viewer is left exhausted. The first stand-alone film for one of Marvel’s most beloved anti-heroes fails on a staggering number of levels.

The story follows reporter Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy) as he becomes infected by an alien “symbiote” and must save humanity from a potential onslaught of the creatures.

It should be noted that the final product screening in multiplexes stemmed from a production nightmare. The film would have been a grittier entry had it not been tailored for Spider-Man crossovers, that is, the now dead “Amazing Spider Man” reboot.

What could have been a star-studded manic freak-out of possession arrived neutered and pre-packaged with the dreaded PG-13 rating. Now, this is not to say the rating is a death knell for all films in the genre, “Thor: Ragnarok” is one of the wonderful exceptions. Unfortunately, “Venom” doesn’t have half the charm or smart writing to save itself.

When your film’s protagonist thrives on biting the heads off of his victims, the sterility of computer-generated imagery (CGI) feels disingenuous. As Venom is an entirely CGI character, it would be expected that said effects are top-notch, with a budget of over $100,000,000.

This could not be farther from the film I witnessed. Venom and the antagonist symbiote Riot appear almost plastic-like in appearance, which proved even more distracting in their final confrontation. The much anticipated battle amounted to no more than giant hunks of goo smashing into each other at varying angles.

In terms of action, the fully formed Venom doesn’t appear until nearly halfway through the film. Here, the film is afflicted with the curse of the “origin story”- too much exposition.

In these doldrums, we are treated to extended scenes of Eddie’s relationship problems, getting fired from his job and drinking PBR’s in his ramshackle apartment- hardly the stuff of           superhero flicks.

Venom’s long-awaited arrival is the best part of the film, as we are treated to mild Cronenberg-esque body horror and a sweaty Tom Hardy fighting off the urge to devour stray pets. Like the protagonist, I almost found myself in a kind of symbiosis with the film’s logic- having fun that is- until the breathtakingly stupid finale brought me back to my senses.

In this finale, the villainous symbiote, Riot, conveniently makes its way to a San Francisco lab from Malaysia. Riot then possesses the villainous human antagonist Drake, a Great-Value Elon Musk-type, who wants to colonize space and also fuse humans and the alien symbiotes. Sounds ridiculous? Well, it is, and the fun at this point had evaporated for me, as Eddie encounters an endless string of deus ex machina. The writing is exceedingly lazy.

Finishing “Venom,” I felt an immense disappointment, imagining if the studio had more guts and was willing to push the boundaries of genre conventions. Instead, they burrow within the superhero formula, and play out the worst clichés of the origin story.

The superhero movie is a dying breed, one that can no longer rely on spectacle to impress audiences. Like other genres, it must learn that good characters and solid writing make a film, not bloodless CGI extravaganzas.

Rating: 3/10