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'Venom' standalone film gets a 2018 release date

The classic Spider-Man villain and comic antihero is taking center stage -- but maybe he should get some orthodontia first.

Gael Cooper
CNET editor Gael Fashingbauer Cooper, a journalist and pop-culture junkie, is co-author of "Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops? The Lost Toys, Tastes and Trends of the '70s and '80s," as well as "The Totally Sweet '90s." She's been a journalist since 1989, working at Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, Twin Cities Sidewalk, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and NBC News Digital. She's Gen X in birthdate, word and deed. If Marathon candy bars ever come back, she'll be first in line.
Expertise Breaking news, entertainment, lifestyle, travel, food, shopping and deals, product reviews, money and finance, video games, pets, history, books, technology history, generational studies. Credentials
  • Co-author of two Gen X pop-culture encyclopedia for Penguin Books. Won "Headline Writer of the Year"​ award for 2017, 2014 and 2013 from the American Copy Editors Society. Won first place in headline writing from the 2013 Society for Features Journalism.
Gael Cooper
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Topher Grace played Eddie Brock/Venom in 2007's "Spider-Man 3."

Marvel

Can you feel the "Venom" taking effect?

The long-time favorite supervillain with terrifying teeth is getting his own standalone film. And now it has a release date.

Mark your calendars for October 5, 2018, to see the alien symbiote take over theaters, Variety reported.

Though not everyone loved Topher Grace in the role of Eddie Brock/Venom in 2007's "Spider-Man 3," the character itself is a classic, ranked the 22nd best comic villain ever by IGN.

"With his hulking physique and monstrous, alien-like mouth (complete with fangs and a drooling tongue), Venom, who has all of Peter Parker's powers, is like a distorted and scary funhouse mirror version of the black costumed Spider-Man, and his knowledge of Peter's secret identity allowed him to target his enemy in particularly cruel and dangerous ways," the IGN list noted.

Screenwriters Scott Rosenberg and Jeff Pinkner, who worked together as writers on the upcoming "Jumanji" reimagining, will write the script, Variety reported.

There's no official title yet (though really, can you go wrong with just "Venom"?), and of course no casting news. Don't expect Grace to return to the role, though: In 2016, he told MovieWeb he didn't plan on revisiting the character in a new film.

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