Morbius, The Living Vampire, first appeared as a villain in The Amazing Spider-Man #101 in October 1971. Created by Roy Thomas and Gil Kane, the character later became a broody and gritty anti-hero in the 1990s. Initially meant to debut in 1998’s Blade, Morbius was one of several planned adaptations between Marvel and Artisan Entertainment. While this never happened, Sony announced in 2017 that they’d be starting a new shared universe of Spider-Man-related characters. Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless submitted a screenplay to Sony for a potential Morbius movie in late 2018. Jared Leto came on board, but he’d only commit if he could have a say in choosing the director. Eventually, Daniel Espinosa got the job, and filming began in early 2019 and wrapped that June. Due to eventual reshoots, the COVID-19 Pandemic, and shifting schedules, Morbius would not see a release until April 2022.
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Synopsis
Dr. Michael Morbius (Jared Leto) is a scientist suffering from a rare blood disease who may have found a cure. He travels to Costa Rica, collects several vampire bats, and experiments on them to find a treatment for his condition. Due to the nature of these experiments, Michael and fellow scientist Martine Bancroft (Adria Arjona) must work in international waters. While he’s successful, Morbius becomes a vampire-like creature with superhuman abilities who must consume blood to stay alive. Soon, his adoptive brother Milo (Matt Smith) learns about what Michael has done and wants the cure, but Michael refuses. Soon enough, the bloodlust consumes Milo as he challenges Michael for denying him what he always wanted. Meanwhile, FBI Agents Simon Stroud (Tyrese Gibson) and Al Rodriguez (Al Madrigal) investigate Michael after a recent string of murders. Will Milo be stopped, and will Michael learn to embrace what he’s become?
Review
You know you’re in trouble when you hire the writers of Dracula Untold, Gods of Egypt, and Power Rangers. With those credits, it’s no surprise that Morbius is an incomprehensible mess that is equal parts confusing and uninteresting. There’s hardly any characterization aside from some backstories, and even then, it’s hard to care about anyone. Everyone delivers their lines with such lifelessness and gloom that it seems like even the actors don’t care. Jared Leto is acceptable in the lead, but you’d expect a guy who plays outrageous characters to deliver that. Instead, he has the broodiness and edginess of a fanfiction character written by a 12-year-old who loved The Crow. Jared Harris feels wasted here, and Adria Arjano doesn’t offer much other than being the damsel in distress. The only bright spot is Matt Smith, who at least tries to be entertaining in a campy way.
To make matters worse, this is possibly one of the ugliest-looking movies I’ve seen in quite some time. Everything looks so drab and dark that it’s emotionally draining, giving Zach Snyder a run for his money. It doesn’t help that the editing is so sloppy and haphazard that it’s often hard to tell what’s going on. These cloudy streaks emanate from Morbius that blur what’s happening during any action sequence, and they mix in some slow-motion. The final battle between Morbius and Milo looks like a badly-rendered cutscene in a video game with all the CGI. Going back to the editing, they tried so hard to tone this down to a PG-13 that it’s almost comedic. It feels like whole chunks of the movie are missing, which would explain why it flies by so fast. Overall, there are worse comic book movies, but that doesn’t make Morbius a good one.
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