So, the folks who have been working on Sony’s upcoming live action Venom feature have been emphasizing the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde theme emanating from the movie. In addition to director Ruben Fleischer, the film’s co-star Riz Ahmed is also pointing out the parallels to the classic, “beast within the civilized man” horror tale.

Ahmed, who plays Carlton Drake in the film, told Den of Geek in a recent interview that Venom is “more like a werewolf movie than a superhero movie.” The Rogue One star went on to explain: “he’s possessed by an external force, stronger than himself, that threatens to take over. It’s kind of a Jekyll and Hyde vibe.”

This Jekyll-and-Hyde angle certainly plays into the film’s marketing materials boasting that this is far more of an anti-hero story than a superhero movie. In fact, one of its trailers straight-up boasts via its tagline: "The world has enough superheroes."

Ahmed, who’s seen the finished film and “loved it,” added that Venom “walks a fantastic tone between horror and comedy.”

In the comics, Carlton Drake led The Life Foundation, a survivalist group comprised of millionaires convinced that nuclear war was inevitable (remember, Drake and The Life Foundation was introduced in 1988, when Cold War paranoia was at its highest). So, Drake would charge the elite millions to reserve spots within these radioactive-proof bunkers.

But the character Ahmed plays in the film is a bit different. In the film, Drake is a sinister industrialist billionaire who’s conducting experiments on people that journalist Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy) believes are deadly. Ahmed says he doesn’t see the character as a villain so much as “a really focused, sincere, egotistical guy with a messianic complex.”

“He’s actually got good intentions of saving humanity, but he’s going about it in slightly ruthless ways and narcissistic ways,” he explained. “I just thought it played to our contemporary reality while still honoring the legacy of the comic books.”

Venom hits theaters on October 5.

(Via Den of Geek)