While Tom Hardy delivers an entertainingly skittish performance, Venom: Let There Be Carnage still proves that this superhero franchise is an odd beast of tone and character.

Although a new director in Andy Serkis (Breathe) has taken the reigns, Venom: Let There Be Carnage follows the same PG-13 formula of the first movie, and with Venom a hit at the box-office it makes business sense to do so.

With that remains the artistry and storytelling that is mind-bogglingly frustrating in its application of cartoonish tone to one of Marvel Comics great monsters, one who needs to feast on human heads to gain sustenance. The Venom franchise is one that direly needs to embrace its beastly nature, yet despite a foray into more adult territory, Venom: Let There Be Carnage continues to play slave to a younger demographic.

Tom Hardy returns as Eddie Brock, an investigative journalist who is host to an alien symbiote named Venom. As the pair struggle to adjust with their arrangement, serial killer Cletus Kasady (Woody Harrelson) has no qualms with his own alien symbiote to become the monstrous and evil Carnage.

Often evoking the Joel Schumacher’s Batman films in its campy approach to a dark comic book character, Venom: Let There Be Carnage offers little more than over the top acting and underwhelming CGI heavy action scenes to make for a hyper-jittery mash of pixels with little substance and paper-thin characters.

While Hardy tries to keep things interesting in a dual performance that can often find an odd comedic rhythm, watching one of the great actors of his generation take on such an underserving role is depressing to watch. Same can be said of Woody Harrelson, who camps it up to nauseating heights as a ginger serial killer who loves to monologue.

Plenty of no-thrills PG-13 violence, accompanied by a soundtrack of hissing and growling and the casual f-bomb, results in an underwhelming yet hyperactive superhero movie that reminds of the pre-MCU bad old days.