If you’ve had enough of heroes, get ready for Venom, the new comic adaptation from Sony Pictures. Director Ruben Fleischer took the Hall H stage at San Diego Comic-Con and promised a movie with “no heroes. . “There’s this guy trying to bite people’s heads off and and this guy, who’s an evil megalomaniac trying to take over the world,” Fleischer quipped gesturing to stars Tom Hardy and Riz Ahmed, who joined him for the panel.

Hardy made his Hall H debut with the panel, explaining that he was drawn to the role of Eddie Brock for two reasons: “I just like the way he looks, first and foremost, and then there’s my son who’s a massive Venom fan.” The actor, who’s known for his dark and rather violent films, wanted to make something his son could watch.

Hardy also explained how the film is handling the character of Brock. “He’s a documentary journalist who falls on hard times and out of favor with his partner and he’s a bit of a loser,” He said. “He’s an anti-hero, so he’ll figure on a goal and he’ll do whatever he has to do to get to that goal, even if he has to do some naughty things to get there…. His ethical structure is off and he’s got no scruples.” But he’s not a bad guys. Hardy added, “He means well, he’s got a truly noble heart.”

But things get notched up a level when he merges with the symbiote Venom. “He kind of finds his perfect opposite partner in his huge great alien beast that arrives and live rent-free in his body,” Hardy said, “and no one will believe him that its there.”

On the other side, we’ve got Ahmed’s Carton Drake, who the actor describes as a genius, billionaire an inventor. “He’s made a lot of breakthroughs in his time, and his foundation, the Life Foundation, is trying to envision what the future of life looks lite because the human race is almost done.” With environmental issues on the rise, Drake thinks the future is in space, so he explores that and that’s where he discovers the symbols. “He’s trying to do right by humanity and save the future,” Ahmed said, “but as they say, to make an omelette you got to break some eggs”

And the footage Fleischer and Co. brought to the con helped illustrate these characters beyond what we learned in the first trailer. In true Tom Hardy tradition, you can’t really understand what the hell Venom is saying, but we got a pretty good look at the antihero in action. First we see Eddie Brock, swaggering through a bodega, where the woman behind the counter tells him “You look like shit.” Well, that’s because he’s got an intergalactic parasite that likes biting people’s heads off. Even more dangerous is the character played by Ahmed, who believes that human beings are expendable, but humans merged with a symbiote are the future of the planet.