Audiences in Las Vegas for CinemaCon Monday night received their first look at Aaron Taylor-Johnson in character as Sony’s newest supervillain, Kraven the Hunter. Aaron Taylor Johnson appeared in a pre-taped video introducing the first footage. He described it as a Marvel movie heavily grounded in the real world.
Cut to a rural countryside where a handful of mercenaries are confronted and hack-and-slashed to death (lots of blood) by the title anti-hero. Russell Crowe, as the dad, provides the “what you are and what you’ll be” narration, noting that he and his son are both predators. The next beat concerns a snowy action scene. We move to the city where he is told that he’s just another man hitting for a trophy. The final beat sees Kraven sitting in an office chair and spearing a baddie who walks into the room. We then get a final bit of action before a cryptic reveal of the Rhino. The tagline is “Nothing survives the hunt.”
Sony has kept the details of the film under wraps up until now, short of emphasizing the film “will bring us on the epic journey that leads Sergei Kravinoff to become one of Marvel’s most iconic villains.” The movie will also include Ariana DeBose, Russell Crowe, Fred Hechinger, Christopher Abbott and Alessandro Nivola.
J.C. Chandor, of “A Most Violent Year” fame, is directing. The project is billed as the next chapter of Sony’s universe of Marvel-licensed characters and comes on the heels of the cult following around the “Venom” franchise and the commercial and critical drubbing of “Morbius.” Art Marcum & Matt Holloway and Richard Wenk wrote the screenplay, while Avi Arad and Matt Tolmach are producing.
But the big news is that A) we’ve got a new version of The Rhino on tap and B) the film will indeed be rated R with blood and guts to show for it.
Kraven the Hunter is a big-game hunter initially introduced as a Spider-Man villain in “The Amazing Spider-Man” #15 (1964), and created by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko. In the comics, Kravinoff began his career using the tools of the hunter but developed a preference to take down large animals with his bare hands. After meeting a Voodoo witch doctor, Kravinoff took a herbal potion which enhanced his physical powers to give him the strength, speed and senses of a jungle cat. The potion also extended his life keeping his health and vitality for years to come.
“Kraven the Hunter” was initially slated for release this past January but was moved to the beginning of the fall movie calendar. As previously reported, Sony has already locked in Taylor-Johnson for multiple pictures as the iconic “Spider-Man” villain.
The actor’s credits include “Bullet Train” alongside Brad Pitt, Christopher Nolan’s “Tenet,” “Avengers: Age of Ultron,” “Godzilla,” Oliver Stone’s “Savages,” Tom Ford’s “Nocturnal Animals,” which scored him a BAFTA Award nomination, Joe Wright’s “Anna Karenina,” and Dave Lizewski’s hit film “Kick-Ass.”
