MORBIUS

A VAMPIRE FOR SONY’S UNIVERSE

HOW MORBIUS REACHED THE SCREEN

Sony announced plans for a shared universe of Spider-Man-related properties in May 2017, Matt Sazama and Burk Sharpless submitted a Morbius script that November, and Jared Leto and director Daniel Espinosa officially joined in June 2018. Leto was “loosely attached” at first and would not commit until he was happy with the film’s direction. Espinosa had directed Life for the studio in 2017.

Principal photography began in the last week of February 2019 in London under the working title Plasma, with Manchester’s Northern Quarter standing in for New York City. The budget was $75 million to $83 million, Jon Ekstrand composed the score, and Leto’s vampire form used motion capture.

“To make a movie through committee, I think, is very hard.”

Daniel Espinosa, two years after release

A BROTHER, TWO FBI AGENTS AND A VULTURE

WHO IS IN THE CAST

Jared Leto plays Dr. Michael Morbius, with Matt Smith as Milo, Adria Arjona as Dr. Martine Bancroft, Jared Harris as Dr. Emil Nicholas, Al Madrigal and Tyrese Gibson as two FBI agents, and Michael Keaton in a cameo as Adrian Toomes, the Vulture, reprising Spider-Man: Homecoming. J. K. Simmons filmed a cameo as J. Jonah Jameson that was cut.

A LONG RUN OF DELAYS AND A MODEST OPENING

HOW THE FILM WAS RELEASED AND WHAT IT EARNED

The film was first dated 10 July 2020 and moved repeatedly, including to 31 July 2020, March 2021, October 2021 and January 2022, before landing on April 2022 after Spider-Man: No Way Home did well. It premiered at Plaza Carso in Mexico City on 10 March 2022 and opened in the US on 1 April. Sony chose not to release it in Russia after the 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

It opened to $39,005,895 in the US and went on to earn $73,865,530 there and $167,460,961 worldwide. The second weekend fell 74%, to $10.2 million, the second-worst drop of all time for a superhero film, and the film is regarded as a box-office bomb.

The negative reception fed an ironic meme culture of exaggerated “praise,” including the fake catchphrase “it’s Morbin’ time,” and Sony re-released the film in about 1,000 theatres on 3 June 2022 as a result. The re-release took $85,000 on its first day and between $280,000 and $300,000 over the weekend, and Sony then pulled the film.

The film’s two mid-credits scenes have Toomes transported into Michael’s universe, where he suggests they form a team.

THE REWATCH

A 15% CRITICS SCORE AND A C+ FROM AUDIENCES

Rotten Tomatoes lists a 15% critics’ score from 288 reviews and a 71% audience score. Metacritic gives it 35 from 55 critics, and audiences polled by CinemaScore gave it a C+. Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun-Times said it “feels more like a just-average 1990s vampire movie,” while Mick LaSalle of the San Francisco Chronicle called it “briskly riveting.” The film received five Golden Raspberry nominations and won two, for Worst Actor (Leto) and Worst Supporting Actress (Arjona).

In the Marvel Marathon it is catalogued as Spider-Verse and sits in the Marvel movies in release order guide between Spider-Man: No Way Home and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. In the Spider-Man movies in order guide it comes between The Daily Bugle Season 3 and Madame Web. It is not in the MCU guides.