Marvel Studios President, Kevin Feige, offers an explanation for why Venom's film success led to the character officially joining the MCU now.

Venom is finally joining the MCU and Marvel Studios President, Kevin Feige, has explained why now is the right time for it. The Marvel Cinematic Universe has grown exponentially over the last 13 years. With the multiverse set to open new doors to comic storylines, the crossover potential is at an all time high. As a result, audiences have been waiting for the MCU to introduce some of Marvel's most iconic characters.

Tom Hardy returned as Eddie Brock/Venom in Venom: Let There Be Carnage, which saw the titular hero face off against Cletus Kassidy, the serial killer who becomes the host for the symbiote known as Carnage. As the film ends, Eddie and Venom are on vacation, enjoying sandy beaches as the credits roll. Venom: Let There Be Carnage set audiences up for Venom's MCU introduction in the post-credit scene as a flash of light triggers a change in Eddie's hotel surroundings before he finds himself staring at the TV as Tom Holland's Spider-Man is unmasked by J. Jonah Jameson at the end of Spider-Man: Far From Home.

With the success of Venom and its sequel, Venom: Let There Be Carnage, fans have wondered if and when Hardy's Venom would appear in the MCU against Holland's Spider-Man. In an interview with Collider, Feige explains why Venom is in the MCU now and that there was a lot of "coordination between Sony and Marvel." Check out the full quote below:

"You look at the obvious comic connotations between Venom and Spider-Man and it is inherent. So the minute Sony made their Venom movie and it worked as well as it did, and Tom Hardy became as iconic as he has become as Venom, then the obvious question is then, 'How do we start to merge them?'"

Prior to Marvel Studios and the creation of the MCU, Marvel has had a long working relationship with Sony. Sony has held the rights to the Spider-Man cast of characters since before Sam Rami's Spider-Man debuted in 2002. In recent years, that relationship shifted to a partnership with Sony lending Spider-Man to the MCU in several films as well as Marvel's support of the subsequent standalone Spider-Man films, which saw MCU characters like Iron Man, Nick Fury, and Dr. Strange appear alongside the web-crawler.

With the amount of villains confirmed to appear, some have speculated on whether Venom may have a cameo role in the upcoming Spider-Man: No Way Home. There are plenty of comics Sony and Marvel could adapt into potential Venom/Spider-Man MCU films. And while it's still unclear how and when a Venom/Spider-Man film will fit into the future of the MCU, Feige confirming Venom's MCU presence means one thing: It's now only a matter of time before these two iconic characters come face-to-face with each other.

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Source: Collider