Will a PG-13 rating help or hurt ‘Venom’ at the box office?

Venom tickets went on sale this morning, which means we now know three things to be true. The Tom Hardy/Michelle Williams/Riz Ahmed/Jenny Slate/Woody Harrelson flick will run 112 minutes. The Rueben Fleischer-directed comic book origin story will be rated PG-13, presumably for an easier transition should Venom and Spider-Man face off in a future installment. And finally, those Thursday previews will begin as early as 5:00 pm on Oct. 4.

Okay, that last one isn’t that important. I would argue that it’s noteworthy because A) it means less time between the review embargo dropping and the first paid showings and B) it sets the table for Sony possibly not including the Thursday preview figure as part of the opening weekend when discussing the second-weekend drop. It worked with Man of Steel, which actually made $128 million on its opening weekend, not the oft-cited $116m figure.