A Review of Kraven the Hunter: Mo' Huntin Mo' Problems
Kraven... My man... Who's idea was it to make a movie about you?
I’m sorry Kraven, but your movie was piss poor.
Kraven the Hunter has been hunting the Amazing Spider-Man since 1964. After 60 long years of chasing the spider, Kraven never caught him, save for the comic Kraven's Last Hunt (1987). Kraven managed to catch Spider-Man, dress up like Spider-Man, fight crime for Spider-Man, place Spider-Man in a coffin, bury Spider-Man under a tasteful tombstone reading "Here Lies Spider-Man," and commit suicide once Spider-Man frees himself.
Like most comic book characters, Kraven finds himself alive again somehow and he's been cloned, replaced by his son Kraven Jr. who wants to be a film producer, and cursed to live forever due to some bad magic he got involved with likely due to his longstanding connection with Calypso. Still... my favorite Kraven the Hunter wasn't even in a Spider-Man comic. It was when Kraven was hanging out with Squirrel Girl while she was going to college and winning fights against everyone from Galactus to Dr. Doom. Kraven loves animals and is a hero when working with the Unbeatable Squirrel Girl who is an outstanding character.
Cool... but why did you tell us all that?
I just wanted to write something nice about such a longstanding character before going in on this movie. Sony being Sony, often tells themselves they know what's best for everything in the Spider-Man Universe since they bought Spidey and his rogues from Marvel in the late '90s. Sometimes, Sony makes great decisions with the Spider-verse as in the first two Spider-Man movies and anything involving Miles Morales. Sony also makes awful decisions regarding the Spider-verse with films like Madame Web, and the Andrew Garfield Spider-Man movies. The best decision they made with these characters was agreeing to co-produce the Tom Holland Spider-Man movies with Marvel.
Maybe it's just me, but I don't want to watch movies about Spider-Man's enemies. I don't want to know what Morbius is doing. I don't care about Venom and I definitely don't care about Carnage because he murders people way too hard. I may have enjoyed watching it, but Madame Web didn't make a lick of sense. So deep down what I am trying to say is that I really hoped Sony would pull off this Kraven the Hunter film. And...
Well...
Sony tried their best.
I'm aware that not enough people read my reviews to mess up any studios' money. God, I hope I have enough clout for that move one day. Kraven wasn't completely terrible, but there were many times I considered leaving the theater and looking up a synopsis. I did not do this. I watched every tepid minute of this block-dud-ster. I'll get into what about this movie made me feel like it should have been delayed until it was forgotten, but I'll answer this next question first.
Should I watch Kraven the Hunter?
Not really.
Maybe if you're bored.
I'm aware that the love of a movie is based on opinion and little else. My opinion on Kraven the Hunter is about a 4 out of 10. In fact, this would have been a much better movie without all the unnecessary Spider-Man talk. This could have been a movie about a guy who hunts evil people because they're evil. That would have been much more interesting. So do you need to see it? Like Thor, I say thee nay. Go watch Moana 2 or that new Lord of the Rings movie instead.
So what really upset you about this movie?
I watch movies with my DEI lens on. It stays on. I love diversity and I love it when it's done correctly. This Kraven film takes that attitude and forces it to feed on itself. Similar to Gladiator 2 other than Calysto (Ariana DeBose), if you're black and have lines, it's curtains for you. Kraven the Hunter barely passes any form of the Bechdel Test which is when two female characters with names speak to each other hopefully about something of note.
White-passing director J.C. Chandor.
After Kraven's (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) big-time prison murderfest, we move 16 years back in time. Kraven's terrible gangster father (Russell Crowe) pulls his boys out of their fancy upstate New York school to tell them their mother died and they're going hunting so they won't be weak like she was. While the older hunting party guys shoot animals we are suddenly jolted over to a biracial teen named Calypso talking to her African grandmother about the power of her ancestors and the great Loa, Papa Legba. After teaching Calypso how to use her tarot cards and predicting the whole film, gramma also gives Calypso the family's secret potion that can heal anyone from anything.
Sergei and his half-brother get separated and attacked by a male lion who is so legendary that killing him would make the hunter a legend (and blah blah blah). Sergei doesn't shoot trying to make peace with the "King of the Jungle" instead. Sergei's father on the other hand doubles back and shoots that lion with no problems causing the lion to attack and try to murder Sergei. The lion drags the boy off so the hunting crew can't find him, but just before Sergei dies, the lion drops him off close to where Calypso's family is having their safari.
Let's simplify:
Sergei Kravinoff has been dragged away by a lion.
Sergei is dropped off near Calypso's family.
Rather than letting the teen die, Calypso decides to give Kraven the Hunter her family's ancestral Papa Legba potion.
She puts one of her grandmother's tarot cards on Sergei before he's carried away.
That is my problem with Kraven the Hunter. A black woman gives up all of her power to help out a white boy she doesn't even know. She's not even sure if it will help. In Kraven the Hunter Sergei gets superpowers and Calypso gets... to be a lawyer that Kraven finds 16 years later. This situation seems purposeful. And if a move like this was NOT done on purpose then it was done out of disrespect which is even more unacceptable. That's why this movie was hard for me to sit through. It was attacking my blackness and it seemed like it was part of the plan.
Oooh Disrespected!
So yeah... Kraven the Hunter is good at violence. Lots of rooms of men being killed. It also has a few cool Spider-Man supervillains in it like The Rhino, The Chameleon, and The Foreigner who stopped being popular before Timothy Dalton stopped playing James Bond. It was nice seeing him in the mix.
At its core, Kraven the Hunter is a movie about white men having problems with other white men and colonized superpowers. They didn't have to write any of that Papa Legba stuff and could have made a better movie without a black woman giving Kraven superpowers. His powers could have easily been some northern phenomenon. Sergei runs away from home and lives on his mother's land for 16 years amongst all manner of rare herbs. He could have easily figured the formula out on his own or made a deal with some Russian gods since most of the characters in this movie are "Russian." Hell, it could have been a better story without Kraven having any superpowers. Unfortunately, that is not the choice they made and you, me, and Marvel as an institution are worse off for it.
Remember that SONY movies are not MARVEL movies.
