Although it was hoped that VENOM would be following in the footsteps of DEADPOOL and LOGAN as an R-rated comic-book movie, the film instead received a PG-13 rating, allegedly because Sony Pictures wanted to keep a potential future Spider-Man crossover in the cards. The film will still be pushing the PG-13 rating to its limit, but it does seem to be causing a little concern with fans. While speaking with MTV International, VENOM star Tom Hardy addressed the rating and believes that the franchise could shift one way or another in future.
To be fair, the thing can fulcrum into R-Rated and fulcrum into youth or children. My littlest ones, they watch Spider-Man and Venom quite comfortably and Venom toys appear and LEGO appear. So it’s not like they’re scared by him, and at the same time there’s a lot within the real estate that you can actually imbue with a complete sense of gratuitous ultra-violence if you really wanted to, and I think you’ve got the right people for that job if you want to push it, ‘cause that’s where I’d love to go with it.
Tom Hardy also commented on the possibility of joining the Marvel Cinematic Universe at some point in the future, and although he says that it's something he'd love to see happen, he's also "more than happy to stand alone. We have a Venom-verse and 900 characters to play with." Riz Ahmed, who also joined Tom Hardy for the MTV interview, joked that Venom would likely just try and eat all of the Avengers if he were part of the MCU. "That's the thing with Venom," Ahmed said. "It's not really so much like good and evil, it's like, 'am I hungry or am I not?' And if you're hungry, you might try and eat the Hulk."
VENOM director Ruben Fleischer has said that it's possible that the home-media release could be unrated. "I wouldn’t rule anything out. We’ll have to see where it lands, I guess, but I wouldn’t rule anything out," Fleischer said. The director also discussed what sets VENOM apart from its comic-book brethren.
When I set out to make the movie, I wanted to distinguish the film tonally, and I wanted to make a darker, grittier, kind of edgier comic book movie that also has a strong horror element, which is inherent to the character and the comic. Those were the aspects: darker, edgier, grittier. I think Tom Hardy embodies all of those qualities. The combination of Tom, Venom the character, and then the look of the film, which we really tried to make look, like I just said, edgy and gritty and dark and grounded of this world.
VENOM will star Tom Hardy as Eddie Brock, a journalist desperate to get his career back on track after a recent scandal. While investigating the Life Foundation and its mysterious leader, Dr. Carlton Drake (Riz Ahmed), Brock is exposed to an alien symbiote which bonds with him and gives him extraordinary powers. VENOM will hit theaters on October 5, 2018.