Thankfully, with Mr. Holland signed up for a new Spidey adventure slated for 2026 release, Sony has announced that this Kraven may be the last of their expanding Spider-Man universe with villain-origin films that don’t have a Spidey cameo or appearance. The disasters of Mobius and Madame Web must have mitigated whatever success Venom created.

And so we have this Kraven/Sergei Kravinoff origin story with Aaron Taylor-Johnson taking on the role of the Russian-born title character. We can’t even call him a supervillain or anti-hero if we strictly go by the storyline of this film. We’re asked to cheer for him here, and the descent to become a supervillain is nowhere in sight. Instead, we get Rhino (Alessandro Nicola) and L’Etranger (Christopher Abbott) as the bad guys.

It’s a family story, with Nikolai Kravinoff (Russell Crowe) casting such a long shadow over the proceedings and little half-brother Dimitri (Fred Hechinger) playing a vital role in the family dynamics. Somewhere in the wings, we have Calypso (Ariana DeBose), but you tell me if there’s a rhyme and reason for her hanging around other than one vial and an arrow.

I entitle this review to Daddy Issues, as what drives our protagonist the strongest would be his trying to disprove that he is his father’s son. It permeates most of what we can discern as motivation and plot development. Fortunately, Crowe and Taylor-Johnson take on the roles and help the exposition rise above the clunky dialogue and thematic repetition.

We also get some plot twists and turns, and I’ll credit them for effort if not outright success. The second half of this film works far better than the paint-by-numbers origin flashbacks or turgid dialogue in between the action. From parkour to the well-executed L’Etranger powers, there is much to like during these sequences.

So, while I was expecting a disaster, I must admit this works better than, say, Joker Folie a Deux or those other Spidey universe break-outs. I’ll even go as far as to say that with the revelation of what Dimitri can do at the film's end, you almost wished there would be a sequel. Thankfully, if we see Kraven again, it will be with him encountering our missing Spidey!