HOLLYWOOD—Here is a piece of advice, just because a character appears in a comic book movie or in a comic book franchise does NOT mean the character needs to have his or her own spinoff people. For those of you not in the know, I’m referring the Marvel flick “Morbius” starring Oscar-winner Jared Leto. Yeah, I should have known there was an issue with the flick after it had been delayed multiple times in recent years and it wasn’t all because of COVID-19 people.
Leto is a great actor, but even he couldn’t save this dismal story with a script that is just as riveting as watching a fly, fly around the room people. The problem with some spinoffs is they just don’t have much of a story to tell to engage the audience. “Venom” that was a spinoff that was entertaining, at least the first flick was, the sequel, not so much. The tale of Michael Morbius who happens to be a foe of our favorite web slinger, Spider-Man aka Peter Parker, is that he suffers from a rare-blood disorder. Michael isn’t the only person who suffers from this rare-blood disorder, so does his bother Milo (Matt Smith) who are both adopted by Dr. Emil Nicholas (Jared Harris).
The brothers bond at a young age over their illness, but as they get older, Michael makes it a mission of his to cure his disorder and he utilizes some vampire bats to do so. Bad mistake because in the process of splicing their genes with his. He gets the result he wants, but fails to realize it comes at a cost: he becomes a blood-thirsty vampire. So the goal here for the writers is to turn Morbius into an anti-hero.
See I really don’t like that notion in the comic book verse. Why? Either you’re a hero or you’re a villain; it is very difficult to tread that line of being both because it requires a level of charism to pull off effortlessly. I mean could you actually name an anti-hero that actually works? I guess I would say Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) in “Suicide Squad,” but that is because she was so eclectic and fascinating to watch on the big screen people. Leto is NOT able to pull off that same feat here. Morbius is simply Spider-Man, the only difference he has taken on all the qualities of bats with a few superhuman strengths along the way.
The vast majority of the film involves Morbius attempting to stop his blood thirsty brother who goes against Michael’s wishes to cure him and becomes darker version of Morbius himself. We have this battle of sibling rivalry where the question is posed if one would be willing to kill their own blood to protect others and to prevent further harm. Interesting question, but nothing that wowed me as a spectator to say I want to see more.
The movie presents a dark atmosphere, but it really doesn’t delve into that era. It’s like “Deadpool,” but Deadpool choose to push the envelope and it absolutely worked in its favor. “Morbius” teeters on rather it should cross the line, and had the film fully embraced the character as it is in the comics, it would have gone full-blown with the blood-lust and the actual threat that Morbius and his brother Milo are. Instead we get a tamer PG-13 version that is not all that exciting or fun to watch. An interesting mid-credits scene teases what could come in a sequel, but with the way the public responded to this movie “Morbius” should NOT expect a sequel, yet alone a cameo in another Marvel flick anytime soon.
