Kraven The Hunter's Second Trailer Reveals Rhino In All His Glory
Sony's Spider-Man Universe continues to focus on supporting characters while keeping the friendly neighborhood crimefighter firmly on the sidelines. Still, the SSU movies do pick their central characters quite well, since folks like Venom (Tom Hardy) and Morbius (Jared Leto) are the sort of figures who have a robust life even when they're not actively fighting Spider-Man. As a continuation of this theme, "Kraven the Hunter" makes perfect sense.
In the comics, Sergei Krafinoff is a hunter and a mercenary with a penchant for difficult prey. As such, even if you remove his greatest target — Spider-Man, of course — from the mix, the character still has a whole world to have adventures in. Played by Aaron Taylor-Johnson, the live-action version of the character radiates the kind of confidence and danger that's necessary for a guy who's willing to hunt Spider-Man for sport ... but, as the newly-dropped second trailer for "Kraven the Hunter" attests, Kraven has a whole bunch of challenges in his life even without the web-slinger.
The second trailer is all about the hunt (and Rhino)
With its obligatory spider reference and confirmation that Kraven is an antihero with daddy issues, the first trailer for "Kraven the Hunter" introduced the audience to Kraven's brutal father Nikolai (Russell Crowe) and multiple characters from Spider-Man's rogues gallery — including Kraven's half-brother Dmitri "Chameleon" Smerdyakov (Fred Hechinger), Aleksei "Rhino" Sytsevich (Alessandro Nivola), and Calypso (Ariana DeBose). It also hints that lion blood may have something to do with how Kraven gets his superhuman powers ... which, at the very least, would explain that lion vest he's so fond of wearing in the comics.
The second trailer offers more insight into these characters, as well as the targets of Kraven's hunting tendencies in the SSU. It also further confirms that the main character will definitely have a noble antihero vibe, which may take some getting used to for comic book fans who know him as a ruthless hunter. Still, there are certain hints — such as the movie's tagline, "Villains aren't born. They're made" — that Kraven's tendency for heroics may not be a permanent personality trait. Fans will find out whether he breaks bad in this movie or stays in the antihero game when "Kraven the Hunter" arrives in theaters on August 30, 2024.