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Sony's second attempt to Follow the Leader and build their own superhero Shared Universe following The Amazing Spider-Man series, Sony's Spider-Man Universe (or SSU) is a Shared Universe created by Sony, based on characters associated with Spider-Man, most prominently Eddie Brock and the Venom symbiote. Though the SSU was once thought to be born out of a Loophole Abuse, given the deal that allowed Peter Parker to appear in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, news broke in 2024 that the lack of Spider-Man was a conscious choice.
Starting in 2018 with Venom, Word of God announced more films based on Spider-Man's supporting cast and villains, with the end goal seemingly being to end with a film based on the Sinister Six. Compared to the more interconnected Marvel Cinematic Universe however, entries in the SSU were largely stand-alone and with only The Stinger of Morbius teasing at the Sinister Six (the first hint in the four years since a Sinister Six film was announced), it left many feeling that the universe lacked a clear plan. Ultimately though, poor critical and financial reception to the films eventually saw Sony shutter the films in December 2024, putting everything other than Spider-Noir on hold.
The films are:
- Venom (2018)
- Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021)
- Morbius (2022)
- Madame Web (2024)
- Venom: The Last Dance (2024)
- Kraven the Hunter (2024)
The television series are:
- Spider-Noir (2026)
The web video series are:
- Chen's Market
- The Daily Bugle
Tropes used in Sony's Spider-Man Universe include:
- Adaptation Deviation: Venom's host before he bonds to Eddie is his friend Maria rather than Peter Parker. Likewise, since Peter Parker is Adapted Out of the Venom trilogy, neither he nor Venom have any grudge against Spider-Man. Combined with Eddie's own Adaptational Niceness, this pushes them right into their Anti-Hero stage from the comics rather than first existing as a villain to Spider-Man. Likewise, since Venom never bonded with Peter Parker, his web-slinging is more of a Rubber Man type rather than mimicking Peter's powers and he doesn't have any negative effects on Eddie's personality.
- Adaptation Species Change: As Sony does not have the rights to use mutants, all mutant characters are either enhanced humans or mutates.
- Adaptational Badass:
- Riot goes from The Brute to The Ace, with Venom saying he and Eddie have very little chance of actually beating Riot in a straight fight.
- Ben Parker is said to be a veteran of the US Army.
- Cassie Webb lacks her comic self's blindness or paraplegia. Though it's ultimately subverted as the events of Madame Web see her suffer those injuries.
- Adaptational Niceness:
- Eddie Brock is introduced as a crusader for the working man whose journalism focuses on exposing Corrupt Corporate Executives. His morals also push Venom to accept Never Hurt an Innocent.
- Venom starts out as much more of a Punch Clock Villain. After he bonds to Eddie, he's more eager to become a superhero and goes out pulling a Taking You with Me Heroic Sacrifice to save the universe.
- Michael Morbius' transformation didn't give him fits of madness. As a result, he's much more stable and Anti-Heroic a character than his mainline counterpart.
- Kraven lacks his usual bloodlust and is reimagined as a vigilante dedicated to animal conservation, targeting poachers. He also lacks his Big Brother Bully tendencies towards Dimitri.
- Adaptational Wimp:
- Donna Diego dies before she can become Scream, and John Jameson dies before he can become Man-Wolf.
- Madame Web frequently mentions that Julia Carpenter, Mattie Franklin and Anya Corazon are Future Badasses but their teenage selves shown in the film proper are just teenage girls.
- Likewise, the same film has Mary Parker as just an ordinary civilian instead of a SHIELD agent.
- Adapted Out: Despite the Character Title, Spider-Man is Demoted to Extra and The Ghost in the SSU.
- Age Lift:
- Cletus Kasady is much older than in the comics.
- Madame Web has Peter Parker as a newborn when Julia Carpenter, Mattie Franklin and Anya Corazon are teenagers when the four are usually around the same age. This also makes him about thirty years younger than Eddie Brock when, again, the two are usually contemporaries.
- Alternate Self: The bartender in The Stinger of Spider-Man: No Way Home has a variant introduced in The Last Dance notably played by the same actor (though with a different hairstyle).
- Alternate Universe: Earth-668. Separate from Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Spider-Noir is set in an alternate 1930s New York.
- Ascended Extra: Sort of, as the Venom symbiote itself was always a major character and later comics did explore how sentient it was in more detail. However it's usually just a supporting character to whoever it's bonded to at the time and has a very limited personality. In the Venom trilogy, Venom actually goes through the most Character Development instead of Eddie and it can be argued he's the true protagonist of the trilogy instead of Eddie, who largely stays the same in all three films.
- Big Eater: Venom.
- Bigger Bad: The Last Dance sets up Knull as such.
- The Cameo:
- Stan Lee makes one of his last in Venom. His likeness cameos on a magazine cover in Venom: Let There Be Carnage.
- British rapper Little Simz cameos as a club MC in Let There Be Carnage.
- Character Development: Due to being the only ones with a trilogy, Eddie and Venom experience this over the course of three films. With Eddie it's more limited and subtle, with a big part of the first two films having him acknowledge his own flaws and mistakes when it comes to treating the people close in his life like Anne and Venom, as well as accepting that whether he likes it or not him and Venom are better together than apart. Venom meanwhile goes through a much more complex development, since Eddie's Heel Face Turn is actually given to him. In the first film his motives for turning on the other symbiotes and saving the world is self-serving, realising that on Earth he's actually powerful instead of a loser and weakling. In Let There Be Carnage while he desires to be the Lethal Protector, it's only because he believes it would be cool and wants to kill people. However in The Last Dance he shows a more empathetic side from the start, being angered when him and Eddie discover some imprisoned fighting dogs and attacking the criminals owning them, as well as being a bit more caring towards Eddie's feelings. In the end Venom eventually realises that the Knull and the Xenophages will never stop hunting him and Eddie for the Codex, leading him to make a Heroic Sacrifice to save Eddie, the world and to live up to what it truly means to be the Lethal Protector.
- Comic Book Movies Don't Use Codenames:
- Though Annie twice bonds with Venom, she never calls herself "She-Venom".
- Enforced by Eddie. Venom wants them to be called the "Lethal Protector" but Eddie finds the name stupid and won't allow it.
- Justified in Madame Web. As an Origins Episode, Cassie hasn't yet thought up of a codename and the girls aren't even superheroes yet so there's no need to think of theirs now.
- Composite Character:
- Carlton Drake becomes Riot in Venom.
- Dr. Paine becomes Agony in Venom: The Last Dance.
- Darker and Edgier: Compared to the MCU films, the SSU is much darker and violent, mainly being populated by antiheroes while even the colour palette being more muted. In many respects, the films could be considered more horror movies than straight up superhero ones. Madame Web is an exception however, being a more traditional superhero film with more heroic leads.
- Gender Flip: Dr. Paine is male in the comics, but female in The Last Dance.
- Immediate Sequel: The Stinger of Venom: Let There Be Carnage leads directly into Eddie and Venom's Eddie and Venom's cameo in Spider-Man: No Way Home. The Last Dance opens during said cameo (albeit reshot) and picks up right when the duo are returned to their own universe.
- Minor Major Character: Given the name, one would expect the SSU to have a Spider-Man in it. It does but Spider-Man himself is The Ghost. Peter Parker's biggest role being when he was a Living Prop to make Mary Parker Imperiled By Pregnancy in the climax of Madame Web (though Morbius recognizes the name when the Vulture alludes to his MCU counterpart). Yet he commands a Character Title.
- Movie Superheroes Wear Black:
- Downplayed for Venom. His primary colour has always been black but since he's not mimicking Spider-Man's costume, he lacks the white stripes typical to the suits he normally makes for Peter and Eddie.
- In the Future Badasses visions during Madame Web, the coloured parts of the Boo Crew's suits are notably more muted than their comic variants.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Carlton Drake in Venom is a walking middle finger to Elon Musk.
- Non-Indicative Name: For a Shared Universe called Sony's Spider-Man Universe, the hero in question is Demoted to Extra.
- Normal Fish in a Tiny Pond: Downplayed for Venom. He's not exactly weak but he is shown to be something of a Badass Normal compared to the other Symbiotes. It's actually a factor in why he likes Earth so much. For once, he gets to be the big dog.
- Not Quite Dead: Venom pulls a Heroic Sacrifice to destroy the Xenophages. But the piece of him that he budded off in Mexico is still around...
- Oddball in the Series: Madame Web. Rather than a Darker and Edgier film starring an Anti-Hero who underwent Adaptational Niceness from the comics, Cassie is already a heroic person (if antisocial) and the film is a Lighter and Softer entry more in line with usual superhero films. And it's set about twenty years before the other films.
- Only in It For the Money: TikTok star Nicque Marina's reason for being a correspondent in The Daily Bugle.
- Our Vampires Are Different: Morbius is a "living vampire" created by science, rather than a supernatural undead being.
- Past Life Memories: Let There Be Carnage establishes that symbiotes have a Hive Mind that spans the Multiverse. This allows Venom to recognize MCU!Spider-Man despite the two never meeting.
- Race Lift: Carlton Drake, Ezekiel Sims, Mattie Franklin and Rex Strickland are non-white in the SSU, and white in the comics.
- Remember the New Guy?: The unseen SSU variant of Spider-Man. When his MCU counterpart is brought up in The Stingers Venom: Let There Be Carnage and Morbius, all the natives of the SSU know who he is based off knowledge of their own Spider-Man.
- Sealed Evil in a Can: The Symbiotes sealed Knull on Klyntar after turning against him.
- Sequel Non Entity: Aside from Mrs. Chen, none of Eddie and Venom's supporting cast appear in The Last Dance.
- Shared Universe
- Shipper on Deck: Venom for Eddie/Anne. Though he accepts that it's not meant to be in Let There Be Carnage.
- Teeth-Clenched Teamwork: Cletus and Carnage. Shriek's sonic powers make her a Man of Kryptonite to a symbiote, driving a wedge into their partnership.
- Title Drop:
- When fighting Venom, Carnage says "let there be Carnage".
- When talking Venom into a dance, Mrs. Chen phrases it by asking for one "last dance".
- Transplant: The MCU's Vulture is, somehow, transported to the SSU by Strange's spell in Spider-Man: No Way Home during The Stinger of Morbius.
- Truer to the Text: Compared to Sony's prior two attempts at Spider-Man, which tried to ground the characters into reality, this one embraces its more outlandish comic book roots.
- Twenty Minutes Into the Past:
- Released in 2024, the bulk of Madame Web takes place in 2003.
- Being an Immediate Sequel, The Last Dance takes place in 2020 despite being released in 2024.
- Unrelated in the Adaptation: In Lethal Protector, Riot, Phage and Agony were created using Venom's genetic material. Here all three are separate Symbiotes.
- Writing Around Trademarks:
- Madame Web goes out of its way to avoid saying "Spider-Man" or "Peter Parker". Julia makes a notable Last-Second Word Swap to refer to Ezekiel as a "Spider... person" and the name of Mary Parker's child is never said.
- The Last Dance's reshooting of Spider-Man: No Way Home's stinger removes all explicit references to MCU characters that Sony doesn't have the film rights to.