The Untold Truth Of Venom

Few comic book characters conjure up horror and then heroism, and then back to horror again, better than Venom. Since debuting in Amazing Spider-Man #300, the inky black space alien has steadily wrapped its tendrils into the hearts of Marvel readers everywhere. The symbiotic creature has proven so consistently popular that it even landed its own movie at Sony, where execs intend to use the character as a cornerstone of its cinematic spider-verse. To prove it, they landed acclaimed star Tom Hardy to play Eddie Brock, the lucky—or unlucky, depending on how you feel about extreme co-dependency with an incredibly powerful visitor from a far-off planet—host of the slinky sentient super suit. But Venom has a long and curious history at Marvel that goes deeper than most people realize, with decades of stories that probably won't even be hinted at on the big screen for several sequels to come (if ever). This is the untold truth of Venom.

It's often said that children are the future. We sacrifice everything for them, nurturing them, passing on our values, filling them with knowledge—and the desire for succulent brainwaves—before trying to kill the little monsters for disagreeing with our murderous agenda. Of course, we're talking symbiotes' asexual reproduction and third-generation Klyntar life-form Toxin here. 

When Venom returned to break Eddie Brock—his favorite host after Spider-Man—out of prison, he left behind a homicidal bundle of joy named Carnage, who bonded with convicted serial killer Cletus Kasady in Amazing Spider-Man #361. Roughly a decade later, Carnage made Venom a grand-symbiote, bearing and then trying to kill its own rugrat, Toxin, in Venom Vs. Carnage #2. After Toxin's first host Pat Mulligan was killed, it found yet another kindred spirit in who else but longtime host Eddie Brock, and helped the then federal agent hunt down Carnage, who was trying to resurrecting an Elder God at the time. 

Sadly, it seems Toxin was killed during the escapade. But you know what they say: if you don't like the death in comics, wait five minutes.

Life is looking pretty sweet for Hank Azaria these days. The longtime character actor always had a pretty good setup as one of the main voices of the long-running animated series The Simpsons—where he portrays Moe Szyslack, Comic Shop Guy, Carl Carlson, and Apu Nahsa...hasape...you know, Apu, and other favorites. Azaria also landed a number of roles in the movie and television world, including one of the leads in Roland Emmerich's Godzilla remake, as well as recurring spots on Mad About You and Ray Donovan. His latest critical darling, though, places his face squarely in front of a camera, as washed-up baseball announcer Hank Brockmire in Brockmire.

Fans of Azaria and Venom might not realize his connection to the comic book antihero, though. On the classic '90s after-school cartoon, Spider-Man: The Animated Series, he provided the voice for Eddie Brock and his slippery alter-ego. Although he only appeared in eight episodes—including a retelling of the costume's now-classic Secret Wars origin story—Azaria voiced the menacing parasite perfectly. In addition to the Simpsons alum, the web-slinging 'toon had a list of legendary actors attached to it, including Golden Girl Rue McClanahan, Mark Hamill (as Hobgoblin, of course), Nell Carter, Ed Asner (as yet another cranky old guy, J. Jonah Jameson), and Nichelle Nichols. 

Even Stan Lee made a cameo as himself. Excelsior!

Most of us would assume that, as a symbiotic entity from outer space, Venom is beholden to his hosts for a temperament—at least one beyond his Spider-Man hate-on—and voice. True, in the early days, the symbiote takes the back seat, content to sip succulent brain chemicals while imbuing its hosts with incredible strength and superpowers. However, Venom does have its own voice, and while often shunted into the royal we, it has on more than a few occasions voiced an opinion contrary to that of his hosts—although usually just as a way to get its hands on some fresh gray matter.

After being "cleansed" of its rage addiction by the Klyntar people in Guardians of the Galaxy #23, the symbiote took to its partnership with Peter Parker's former high school foe Flash Thompson with renewed vigor and valor. After it was separated from Flash in 2016's Venom reboot, it sought a new host in former Army Ranger Lee Price. Despite being weakened and unable to escape, thanks to Price's psychological training in the military, it continuously criticized Price's illicit behavior and callous violence—even trying to sabotage his criminal activities. Of course, once Spider-Man teased it with a reunion, Venom seemed to revert to its rage-filled state. Way to crush all that character development, Spidey. Very uncool.

As Spider-Man quickly found out, it's never a good idea to reject a symbiote—especially one who hooks up with Spider-Man hater, Eddie Brock. Just imagine what would happen if the symbiote had attached itself to someone with a real ax to grind, such as one of Peter's longtime enemies or exes.

In Comic Creators on Spider-Man, Spidey writer David Michelinie discussed the origins of the Klyntar alien. When planning for Amazing Spider-Man #300, Editor Jim Salicrup sought a killer hook for the anniversary issue. Michelinie took the opportunity to break down his idea: a man is run over and killed by a cabbie, who's distracted by a Spider-Man-related battle, right in front of his wife. Due to the trauma, she goes into labor and her child tragically dies during birth. Consumed by misdirected hatred, the Spider-hating woman is sought out by the symbiote, who also has a beef with the Web-head. The two bond over their loathing and hunt down Spider-Man.

Ironically, Salicrup shot down the idea, worrying readers wouldn't believe a Venom-empowered woman could take down Spider-Man. We guess he forgot the old saw that hell hath no fury like a symbiote scorned.

When it came to Venom, Spider-fans probably pondered the symbiote's true beginnings at first. In the long run, though, all it took was an attachment to complicated old Eddie Brock to drive the story forward. Nevertheless, Venom received a semi-backstory in the "Planet of the Symbiotes" arc in 1995, during the height of alien death-skin fever. Even though the tale revealed an entire planet of the parasitic life forms, the alien race didn't receive a designation—along with a revamped origin story—for another 20 years.

During his time kicking it with Flash Thompson and the Guardians of the Galaxy, Venom finally received an official origin story. Guardians #23 introduced the Klyntar species, while also clarifying them as a benevolent group, misconstrued by the kookier elements of their race. Apparently, the symbiotes need to bond with the evenly balanced individuals. When their hosts don't have their you-know-what together, a symbiote easily becomes corrupted—much as what happens with Venom and Eddie Brock's intense Spider-loathing. 

It also didn't hurt that Venom spent some time with Deadpool, thanks to a retcon. 

Before Deadpool was retconned as Venom's first host, Spider-Man was the first human to don the alien skin. Upon his return from space, after Secret Wars' intergalactic superhero showdown, he discovers his new duds have feelings and gets Reed Richards to blast it off with a sonic weapon—always handy to have around. When the suit returns in Web of Spider-Man #1, sneaking into Peter's closet and disguising itself as his classic Spidey-suit, it tries to perma-bond to Peter. Peter knows the symbiote is vulnerable to sound and fire, but lacking a lighter and hairspray or an air horn, he has to improvise— or find himself a perpetual resident of codependence city.

Since Peter's a long way from the Baxter Building, the home of the Fantastic Four, he's quickly running out of time, at least until the bells at Our Lady of Saints begin to chime. Their cacophonous ringing, coupled with Peter's rejection, forces the alien suit to flee the scene. Suffering from the bad break-up, it stumbles into the church, finding an angry young Spider-foe in the making named Eddie Brock. The rest, as they say, is history.

Some Spider-fans consider Sam Raimi's Spider-Man trilogy the definitive wall-crawler saga. However, Spider-Man 3 came as a major disappointment to many devotees, despite its box office haul. Not only did it slow momentum in the otherwise wildly popular series—there was a planned fourth flick in the works—but it introduced antihero Venom in a rushed and unsatisfactory manner. In addition, Topher Grace, previously known as Eric Forman on That '70s Show, was miscast as the usually meat-headed Eddie Brock. Heck, the entire feature had a slapdash feel to it, something off-kilter coming from the meticulous and stylized Raimi.

There's a very good reason for the shortcomings of the movie: years later, Raimi discussed the changes and what could have been. The Vulture and Sandman were intended to be the main villains initially, but producer Avi Arad (understandably) felt an old guy in a bird getup wouldn't crank out toy sales. As a result, he pushed the director to include Venom and the full-circle story where Harry Osborn becomes the new Goblin. By the time the studios interjected Captain and Gwen Stacy into the mix, the story was overloaded with characters and the picture simply became unwieldy.

Hopefully, Venom gets a more admirable reintroduction in his solo flick. Plus, it would be awesome if Raimi gets another shot at a Spider-flick, studio meddling-free.

If big-budget superhero movies aren't your thing, you don't need to wait to see an interesting live-action take on Venom thanks to Joe Lynch's Truth in Journalism.

Released as a fan film in 2013, the documentary-style movie follows disgraced photojournalist "Eddie B." as he makes his way through the streets of New York, finding — and occasionally manufacturing — salacious news stories. Needless to say, it turns out that Eddie's hiding an even bigger secret. Spoiler warning: he's actually a weird symbiote monster from space who eats people.

Even though it's a foregone conclusion from the first shot, the big reveal of Venom at the end is incredibly well-done and remarkably tense, kicking off with a thrilling gross-out sequence where he pukes up the symbiote before turning against the film crew that's been accompanying him on his adventures. Ryan Kwanten, of True Blood fame, also does a great job with this movie's version of Brock as a completely amoral opportunist, building his quiet sense of menace throughout. If you've never seen it, it's well worth the 20 minutes it'll take to give it a watch, but make sure you stick around after credits. Like most Marvel movies, there's an additional surprise to be found.

Ever since Peter Parker discovered that the black costume he picked up during Secret Wars was both fashionable and a sentient creature hell-bent on controlling his body, Venom has been considered one of Spider-Man's deadliest foes. It only got worse when the symbiote joined up with Eddie Brock, whose hatred of Peter only amplified the alien costume's resentment after being rejected. It doesn't take a lot of analysis, however, to see the subtext in that relationship. The rejection, the jealousy, the new partner picked up on the rebound — for all intents and purposes, the symbiote is basically reacting like a scorned lover.

But here's the thing: that's not just subtext. The idea that the costume was actually in love with Peter was the focal point of one of the greatest Venom stories of all time, which ran courtesy of writer David Michelinie and artist Todd McFarlane in Amazing Spider-Man #317. The idea was that after subtly threatening Peter's family, Eddie Brock challenged Peter to a one-on-one fight to the death with no interference from the Fantastic Four, far away from any church bells that could put the symbiote out of commission. Alone and completely outmatched in terms of strength, Peter made the desperation move of stripping off his costume and allowing the Venom suit to return to its first love.

If the subtext had been difficult to see before (it wasn't), then the sight of Peter Parker standing on a beach in tiny underpants offering up his body while shouting "you want me? Then take me! I'm yours!" and thinking about how the symbiote was still in love with him put an exclamation point on the whole thing. It worked, though — the symbiote's relationship with Eddie turned out to be too deep to drop all at once, leaving him passed out on the beach in his underpants covered in a viscous ooze. That ain't subtext anymore, folks, that's super-text.

If you're familiar with Spider-Man foe Mac Gargan, it's probably from his original villainous identity: the Scorpion. Introduced in 1964, Gargan was a crooked private eye hired by J. Jonah Jameson to dig up dirt on everyone's favorite web-slinger, but when that didn't work out, JJJ decided that it would probably a good idea to do some mad science on him and give him a robotic scorpion tail instead. This was not, in fact, a good idea, and wound up creating a supervillain who hated Spider-Man and Jonah in equal measure, and remained one of Spider-Man's most reliable foes for years.

In 2005, however, he decided to go in a bit of a different direction. When Eddie Brock found Jesus, he decided to give up the symbiote and accept his fate of dying from the cancer that the suit had been keeping in check for years. Gargan won an underworld auction and became the new Venom, and not only did he fight Spider-Man in this identity, he actually replaced him, too. When Norman Osborn was put in charge of Homeland Security, he put together a new team of Dark Avengers, made up of supervillains standing in for heroes. Moonstone was made the new Ms. Marvel, Bullseye was the new Hawkeye, and Gargan, with the Venom symbiote, was his team's all new, all-murderous Spider-Man.

As for Eddie, well, it turns out that he didn't die of cancer at all. Instead, the combination of another villain's healing powers and a chance encounter with an old symbiote caused a reaction that gave Brock his powers back — and more. Rather than just the black costume, this new version turned him into a sort of color-inverted version of Venom who had the ability to cure others of symbiote-related afflictions and fought crime as — wait for it — Anti-Venom.

Readers with fond memories of the '90s might recall the New Fantastic Four, an awesome, tongue-in-cheek comic where the FF went missing and were replaced by a quartet of Marvel's most marketable heroes. Billed as "The World's Most Collectible Comics Magazine," the new roster was made up of Spider-Man, the Hulk, Ghost Rider, and, of course, Wolverine.

In 2012, though, there was another unlikely group that was formed to deal with the demonic threat of Mephisto, re-creating the New FF with a hilariously dark twist. It was called the Circle of Four, and each member was a present-day equivalent to their counterpart. Agent Venom filled the role of Spider-Man, the Red Hulk stepped in for the Hulk, and Wolverine was replaced by X-23, his young female clone who would eventually take over as the All-New, All-Different Wolverine. And Ghost Rider? He wound up being replaced by two different versions of the character: the original motorcycle-riding hellion, Johnny Blaze, and his new protege, Alejandra Jones, neither of which had been the Ghost Rider in the original story.

Sadly, like the team that inspired it, this amazingly weird gathering of heroes didn't stick together. But who knows? When the time is right, maybe the Circle of Four (which is actually the Circle of Five) can get back together. Maybe they can even team up with the New FF as the new Fantastic Eight or Possibly Nine!

If you go into it looking to find out what happened to your favorite superheroes, Mark Millar and Steve McNiven's Old Man Logan is a pretty huge bummer. Structured as a western about a broken, older Wolverine and a blinded Hawkeye driving across a devastated America that's been carved up by supervillains, it's structured entirely around revealing how the heroes of the Marvel Universe died...or worse.

If you like Venom, though, buckle up, because you're going to have a good time. One of the minor plot points — and the fact that this is minor should be a good indication of how messed up things are in that future — is that the dinosaurs of the Savage Land have taken over a big chunk of the midwest. To make matters worse, Logan and Hawkeye encounter one of those dinosaurs on their journey: a Tyrannosaurus Rex that's bonded with the Venom symbiote to create Earth's perfect killing machine.

The kicker of it is that while a Venom T-Rex (V-Rex?) has no real reason to attack Hawkeye and Wolverine on their own, they made the mistake of driving through its territory in Spider-Man's old car, the Spider-Buggy. It turns out that even in a dinosaur, those memories of how much it hates Spider-Man tend to stick around, and even the sight of a car is enough to enrage it.