Venom 3: Andy Serkis explains why he isn’t directing the new sequel

After directing the Marvel Comics adaptation Venom to its $856 million success at the box office, Ruben Fleischer turned his focus to making Zombieland: Double Tap and Uncharted – so Andy Serkis took over as director on Venom: Let There Be Carnage. That sequel earned $506 million at the pandemic era global box office, and Serkis said he would be glad to return to the helm for a follow-up. When asked by Metro whether he’d come back for Venom 3, he told them, “I mean, yeah, of course. It’s such a wonderful world to play in.” But a couple weeks ago, it was announced that Venom 3 is actually going to be directed by Kelly Marcel, who worked on the screenplays for both previous films. So what happened with Serkis?

Serkis told Slash Film that he’s too busy with other projects to work on Venom 3. He said, “Look, I had a ball doing [Venom: Let There Be Carnage]. Tom Hardy is such a good friend of mine, and I felt very proud of the work, and we had such fun doing it. To be the custodian of that franchise for a little while was great. I’ve got so many projects that I was just about to [work on], like ‘Animal Farm‘ for instance. We were just about to go into production with that, and then we delayed as ‘Venom‘ came up. I really have to be very on top of the ones that I’ve been building to do for such a long time. But I’m really delighted that Kelly’s doing that. She’s so in control of that material with Tom. The pair of them are such a great team to work with. I’m really excited to see what they’re going to come up with.“

Venom 3 will be Marcel’s feature directorial debut. She also wrote the screenplay, based on a story she crafted with returning star Tom Hardy.

Are you looking forward to Venom 3? Were you hoping Serkis would be back to direct this one? Let us know by leaving a comment below.