Warning: This article contains spoilers for Venom.
Venom made its debut last Friday, and while the film broke October box office records with its $80 million opening weekend earnings, reviews for the movie were mixed.
However, while a lot of fans felt rather conflicted about the Venom standalone's narrative choices and its weak, PG-13 rating, others couldn't help but praise Tom Hardy's performance as Sony's new Eddie Brock and as the violent symbiote, Venom.
Speaking in an interview with Polygon, Venom director Ruben Fleischer couldn't help but gush over the energy Hardy put into his work, saying that it was the actor's dedication that gave the film life.
"Tom's a naturally funny person in his own right and I don't think that's ever been showcased," the filmmaker told the publication. "So I was thrilled that he leaned it."
Not only did Hardy spend time trying to obtain the closest simulation to actually having another voice inside his head the same Eddie Brock has with Venom constantly guiding him, but the actor also improvised one of the best scenes in the movie. Remember that moment where a rabid Eddie barrels into a fine-dining restaurant in search of raw meat and then escalating into a decision to munch through raw lobsters? That was all Hardy, apparently.
"At that [rehearsal], Tom saw that the production designer had put a giant lobster tank in the center of the restaurant and that was just a true design choice just to make it seem like a fancy restaurant. As soon as Tom sees it, he goes, ‘Well, I'm going to go in the tank,'" the director recounted.
"The designer was like, ‘We didn't build it for somebody to go in!'" Fleischer continued. "And, you know, they were all live lobsters."
Hardy certainly was determined to bring Venom to life the best way he could, and in a sense, the actor embodied the brashness of Brock by improvising that scene.
Venom is currently screening in cinemas.
Read: Venom: Photo of Eddie Brock's Notebook Detail's Carnage's Origin