Venom

The creature that goes by the name Venom is not a single being like most comic characters. Instead, “Venom” is the fusion of two of Spider-Man's foes: one alien, and one man. The Symbiote The alien part of Venom is a life form called a Symbiote. The one called Venom is not the first or only symbiote (it’s actually the 998th in its line), but part of a race of extra-terrestrial parasites. Their home planet is unknown but they have existed for millions of years. The Symbiote species lives by attaching itself to hosts and feeding off their adrenaline. They often drive hosts to extreme acts resulting in death in order to consume the large amounts of adrenaline produced immediately before they die. As a result of this, symbiote hosts don’t live long and symbiotes therefore have many hosts in their lifetimes. The one exception to this was Venom. The Venom symbiote desired to bond with a single host and to live with it instead of dominating and killing it. Because of this, Venom was looked down on by others of his species and was eventually imprisoned so his insane notions wouldn’t spread. Captive and without a host, Venom was sent to Battleworld, the setting of the very first Secret Wars and first appeared in Secret Wars Vol. 1 8. During Secret Wars, many of Marvel’s greatest heroes and villains were set against each other by the being known as The Beyonder. Among the combatants was Spider-Man, who was to be the first host of Venom. After one particular clash, Spider-Man’s costume was damaged and he needed a replacement. He found out that there was supposedly a machine that repaired costumes so he went to find it. Instead, he found the device that had been holding Venom captive. When Spider-Man activated the machine, Venom came out in the shape of a black ball . The orb set off Peter’s spider-sense but he picked it up anyway. The ball oozed over Spider-Man and covered him like his old costume had. Strangely though, it copied the look of Spider-Woman’s costume. Spider-Man soon discovered that the symbiote increased his physical abilities, made its own (seemingly unlimited) webbing, could change its appearance, had a “dimensional aperture” where he could store small objects, and could respond to his thoughts. With all these benefits, Spider-Man decided to keep the suit and continued to wear it even after the end of Secret Wars.The symbiote trying to rebond with Spider-ManFor a while things were ok, but that didn’t last for long. When wearing the costume during the day, Peter found himself acting unlike himself and more aggressive than usual, and at night, the symbiote was fighting crime while he slept! After finding out this and other things (like that the costume’s webbing was organic) Peter went to Reed Richards, the smartest guy he knew, to help him figure out what was going on. What Mr. Fantastic figured out stunned Peter. The suit was alive, and not only that, it was trying to permanently bond with him. With the help of Mr. Fantastic and a “Sonic Blaster” he’d created, the suit was removed from Peter and was kept contained…for a while.Unfortunately for Peter, the symbiote somehow escaped and found its way back to him. In the first issue of Web of Spider-Man, it reattached itself to him by making itself look like one of his normal, red and blue, suits so Peter would put it on. As soon as it was on, he knew what was going on and he frantically tried to get it off. Remembering that Reed has used sound to hurt it before, he made his way to a church’s bell tower and let the sound of the bell force the symbiote off of him. He watched as it melted away and assumed it would die and never return.He was wrong. The symbiote was weak, but it wasn’t dead. It went after the closest person it could find, and that just happened to be Eddie Brock.Eddie BrockEddie Brock is the other part of (the original) Venom. The symbiote was the alien, and Eddie was the man. Brock’s past isn’t as long (or important) as the symbiote’s. Before Venom, he was just a journalist, a very good one to be sure, but nothing really special. He was best known for a piece he wrote which revealed the identity of a very high-profile killer, and that is where his connection to Spider-Man (and Venom) starts. Soon after his amazing article was published, Spider-Man revealed the true identity of the Sin-Eater, and it didn’t match what Eddie Brock had written. As a result, Eddie’s career was ruined and he lost his job. Things only got worse from there. His father disowned him, his wife left him and the rest of his life went down the drain, leaving him in a deep depression and causing him to blame Spider-Man for all of it. Eventually he decided to commit suicide and the night that Venom was forced from Spider-Man above the church, Eddie was inside that same church, praying one last time before he ended his life.It may have been just chance, or it may have been Eddie’s supreme hate for Spider-Man, but whatever the reason, the symbiote made its way to Eddie Brock and the two bonded perfectly and permanently. Both had strong feelings towards Spider-Man and their thoughts mixed. The symbiote’s thoughts were positive (even though Spider-Man had abandoned him) but it was still confused as a result of the pain caused by the bell. Eddie Brock’s strong negative feelings for Spider-Man overpowered the symbiote and drove it crazy, and soon after that, evil. Together they called themselves Venom and killing Spider-Man was the only thing on their mind.Venom There have been others to bond with the symbiote and call themselves Venom, but the first, the most well known, and the one with the longest history, was Eddie Brock. For this reason, the Eddie/Venom is the one who gets the main Venom section.Venom & Spider-ManWhen Eddie and the symbiote became Venom, each part shared their hatred for Peter Parker/Spider-Man. They became one of (if not) the greatest enemies Spider-Man ever had. With the symbiote’s knowledge, Venom knew everything about Spider-Man. Not only that, Venom had all of Spider-Man’s powers, and was capable of preventing his spider-sense from being set off, giving him an undeniable edge.Venom’s first attack on Spider-Man came in Web of Spider-Man 18. It wasn’t a major attack, but it was important. He pushed Peter Parker in front of a moving train and disappeared before he could do anything about it. Peter survived of course, but that attack showed that Venom was potentially undetectable, and he knew who Peter really was. A scary thought for someone who depended on his spider-sense being able to warn him, and whose secret identity was integral in keeping everyone he loved safe.Venom's first full appearanceThe first real battle between Venom and Spider-Man took place in Amazing Spider-Man (Vol. 1) 300. After surprising Mary Jane in her apartment earlier, Venom was spotted by Spider-Man and they fought in an abandoned building. Venom revealed his identity as Eddie Brock merged with the now-evil symbiote. He told his whole story about how Spider-Man ruined his life, and they continued to fight. At one point, Spider-Man thinking he had won, tried to leave but was knocked out by Venom. Venom took Spider-Man to the church where it all started and webbed him up inside the bell. Spider-Man managed to break free and the two fought again. This time Spidey got the upper hand and knocked Venom off a building, leaving him unconscious. Venom was then taken to the Fantastic Four where he was kept until a cell in The Vault (a prison for superhuman criminals) could be made for him.Venom didn’t stay in the Vault for long though. Using its shape shifting powers, the symbiote part of Venom turned into a guard’s uniform and when another guard found Eddie (acting like a fallen guard), he opened the door, letting him out. As thanks, Venom killed the young guard and escaped the Vault, heading to New York and after Parker.He made a stop before he reached New York though. For no reason at all, he prevented the holdup of a truck stop on his way to the city. Once he reached New York he went to an old fallout shelter he knew of spent some time working out. Before fighting Spider-Man, Venom came across Black Cat and roughed her up a bit in an effort to locate Peter. She didn’t know where he was so Venom left her and went to look for himself.Eventually Peter found out that Venom was after him and turned the chase around. What he didn’t know was that Venom knew that he knew and was now chasing him again. When Peter gave up looking for Venom, Eddie finally revealed himself and they fought again. Venom was in control for most of the fight but Spider-Man got the drop on him and somehow managed to get Venom under some heavy machinery. Spider-Man was able to escape but didn’t realize that Venom was alive. He also didn’t realize he’d left some clothes at the scene of the fight and Venom now had his new home address at he’d had in his pocket.Venom and Eddie BrockThe next day, Venom (as Eddie Brock) went to Peter’s house to talk. Venom told Peter that he didn’t like to hurt innocents and they arranged to fight later at another place. When Spider-Man came for the fight, Venom was ready. He started pounding away and for a while it looked like he was going to win. Then Spider-Man offered the symbiote the chance to bond with him. The symbiote tried to bond with Spider-Man but it couldn’t leave Eddie and as a result, all three were knocked out. When Venom woke up he was being taken back to the Vault.Venom escaped the Vault during a prison break at one point but was captured and returned by the hero, Quasar. He tried again and was successful the second time. Using the symbiote to create a fake skin over him, he pretended he had committed suicide and escaped from the morgue. He didn’t stay out of jail long though, but he did manage to fight Spider-Man once more before he was sent back. His next prison-break was facilitated by the symbiote. It broke into prison and freed Eddie, but also left behind a child that would go on to become the villain known as Carnage.Once again, Venom’s first thought after getting out of jail is to go after Spider-Man. He did better than previous attempts, managing to first trap Spidey in a cryogenics chamber, and then taking him to a deserted island. Spider-Man only survived by faking his death so Venom would think he’d finally won.Venom was still alone on the island when Carnage started his killing spree and Spider-Man needed help to stop him. Of course, Venom was who Spider-Man turned to for help since they were both symbiotes, but Venom wasn’t happy to see Spider-Man (and the Human Torch who he’d brought for backup) since he thought he’d already killed the wall-crawler. Venom was so mad that he destroyed the sonic blaster Spider-Man had brought with him, and started giving both heroes a horrible beat-down. The Human Torch eventually got the Fantasticar to fire a sonic blast through its speakers and take down Venom. Spider-Man then reasoned with Venom, telling him that innocents were in danger because of his child. Venom decided to help (after getting Spider-Man to agree to let him go free afterwards) and willingly teamed up with his most hated foe. Venom and Spider-Man (Human Torch had to leave to go back to his own team) went after Carnage, but the red symbiote was to powerful for both of them! Carnage escaped by using a baby to distract Venom, but Spider-Man figured out where he was heading so the two of them went after him. Finding Carnage at a metal concert, Venom and Spider-Man fought him for a while, even taking him down into the subway and throwing him on the third rail. Carnage was too tough of an opponent though and was able to get back to the concert. Venom and Spider-Man followed, and while Venom held Carnage down, Spider-Man hit him with sonics from the speakers. After Carnage was beaten, Venom and Spider-Man get into a fight, but Mr. Fantastic and the Human Torch had been ready and waiting. Venom got captured and was sent to the Vault yet again.Before Venom could reach the Vault, two demonic creatures attacked the prison vehicle’s guards, killing them. Although this set Venom free, he vowed to kill them since the guards had been innocent. This led into a cross-over with Ghost Rider and some of his enemies that appeared in two books, Web of Spider-Man and Spirits of Vengeance. Throughout the cross-over there was a lot of meaningless fighting and it all ended up with Venom back in the Vault. That didn’t worry Venom though, and soon enough he had broken out again. Once out, he read in the newspaper that Peter Parker had been reunited with his parents (for the full story on Peter’s “parents”, check out the Spider-Man page), and decided that that just wasn’t right, so he planned to ruin Peter’s happiness.Venom, as Eddie Brock, went to Peter’s house and started talking to his parents. Fortunately for them, before he could do anything, Spider-Man arrived and starting fighting Venom. In this fight, Venom was in control almost the whole time, and easily took Spider-Man down. While Spider-Man was out cold, Venom kidnapped his parents and took them to an abandoned amusement park where he’d been hiding. He told them he’d protect them from Spider-Man but they denied knowing who he was. Venom questioned revealing the masked hero’s identity but instead said, "No! We won't tell you either! It would only break your hearts! And your Innocence, above all else, is what we've sworn to preserve!"When Spider-Man came looking for his parents, Venom went out to meet him. He told Peter that he was keeping his parents safe by getting them away from [Peter’s] bad influence. Venom was just about to fight Spider-Man when his ex-wife came out of nowhere and started to talk him out of it, saying they could start over. Venom was considering it when Silver Sable and the Wild Pack (hired by J. Jonah Jameson) attacked him. Venom, convinced that Spider-Man had set the whole thing up, lashed out. First he struck Spider-Man (several times), then, when the Wild Pack started shooting at him, he turned on them. He ignored their sonic cannons and tore through the team. Spider-Man even helped out, fighting the Wild Pack while asking them why they’d come. Venom looked around and saw Peter’s parents in a ring of fire (started by a member of the Wild Pack) and wondered if he should save them. Since they were innocent he decided that it was the right thing to do and he saved the, taking them to his ex-wife and telling them to get to safety. By this time Spider-Man had finished off the Wild Pack and was looking for Venom. He found him and for a while they fought, destroying everything in sight. Venom knocked out Spider-Man but a member of the Wild Pack shot him with a sonic blaster before he could get the finishing blow. Peter’s mother took down the Pack member and Venom went back to Spider-Man after thanking her. She was disgusted, angry that he was going to kill someone right after she saved him. Just then, a Ferris wheel began to fall on her and Venom tried to stop it. The sonic blast had weakened him and Spider-Man had to help him. After that, the two made a truce; neither would go after the other. Venom got away on a nearby helicopter and was on his own for a while.Lethal ProtectorVenom next showed up in San Francisco,There he took up the role of a protector, a lethal protector. The job was hard though. Venom was constantly bothered by cops who wanted to arrest him, and though he didn’t want to, he was almost always forced to fight them. It didn’t take long for Spider-Man to renege on his part of the agreement and within days he was already trying to fight Venom when all he was doing was protecting some homeless people. Venom escaped though and went underground with the homeless people he had saved. Trouble, being attracted to Venom as it was, came in the form of “diggers”. Huge machines that were digging in the sewers the hobo’s called home. Venom fought the machines to protect the hobos and the battle destroyed the sewer and dropped them all into a secret, underground cave system where the homeless people had created their own society in an underground city. To keep the city safe, Venom broke into the building of Roland Treece, the man who ran the company that owned the diggers and threatened the underground people’s way of life.After vandalizing Treece’s company office, Venom was attacked by a group called The Jury. He defeated them and escaped only to be spotted by one of Treece’s helicopters. The aircraft wasn’t there to attack Venom though. When Venom jumped inside it he saw a message on a computer left by Treece. Seeing Venom’s abilities had gotten him interested and Treece wanted to hire Venom as head of security. Venom, knowing it was probably a trap, let the helicopter take him to Treece’s base. Though Venom was suspicious, he was prepared when walls of flame surrounded him. Treece’s boss, Carlton Drake, had trapped Venom so he cold get a sample of his symbiote so he could make his own.Drake was successful, and while he sent the (female) symbiote out to fight Spider-Man, Venom broke free of his cage. He wasn’t free for long though. Sonic blasters carried by Drake’s men were able to get Venom to stop fighting. Spider-Man came to Venom’s rescue, but before he could reach him, Drake had his men shoot Venom so much that Eddie Brock and the symbiote were separated. While Venom was taken to a back room where he was to be killed, Spider-Man fought more of Venom’s “children.” Spider-Man was having a hard time with them and a symbiote-less Eddie Brock went to help. Eddie and Spider-Man used spare sonic blasters to stun the symbiotes while Eddie could go find Venom. With Eddie and the symbiote back together and a bigger, better sonic blaster, they were able to kill the symbiotes without hurting the humans inside. Thinking that all was lost, Drake blew up the building and escaped. Venom (and Spider-Man) also got out safe and Venom wasn’t done with Drake and Treece.Venom didn’t go after Drake, but when he found out that Treece was still planning on destroying the land above the underground city, he went after him. Spider-Man, not knowing that Treece was a bad guy, fought Venom and tried to stop him. Venom was able to subdue Spider-Man and explain to him what was going on and the wall crawler decided to help. A huge fight broke out between Treece’s digger robots and the two heroes but Venom and Spider-Man were able to handle themselves. During the fight, the building Treece was hiding in was covered in flames. Spider-Man was still fighting digger so Venom had to deal with the situation on his own. Would he let Treece die in the fire? Or would he brave the flames to kill him himself. Venom did the unexpected and suffered the heat of the fire to save Treece! Afterwards, Spider-Man asked him why and he replied, “Would you have done any less?” When Spider-Man looked around, Venom disappeared and went back to live with the people underground.Maximum CarnageCarnage, the child spawned by the Venom symbiote when it came to rescue Eddie Brock from prison, escaped from whatever prison or asylum he had been kept in, and teamed up with another symbiote, Shriek. Together they decided to go after Spider-Man and Venom. Spider-Man was easy to find, but Venom was still in San Francisco. Venom saw the chaos being caused by his offspring on T.V. though, and made his way to New York. When he arrived he tracked Carnage to a park but was easily beaten. Bruised and bloody, he made his way to the Parker residence. Once healed, Venom and Spider-Man (along with the Black Cat) went after the symbiotes. Carnage and his gang beat the good guys by dropping a building on them.Spider-Man saved his allies but Carnage was able to escape. Venom and Black Cat yelled at Spider-Man for letting it happen and left to find Carnage on their own. They ran into Cloak (he and Dagger had fought the symbiotes earlier) and they teamed up. They also accepted Morbius onto their team and the four of them took on Carnage and his cronies. Venom saved Mary Jane (she happened to be nearby) and Spider-Man arrived to help. Together, the team drove off Carnage’s team.The next time the two sides clashed, Venom got the better of Carnage and was about to kill him when Spider-Man stopped him. The fight started again and the “good guys” decide that they really should kill Carnage if they get the chance. When they did get the chance though, they choose to spare him, all except Venom. Venom turned on his allies for not killing Carnage, and while he was complaining, Carnage and Shriek recovered and attacked and took Venom away to torture him.While Venom was being tortured, the other heroes got help from other heroes and were able to defeat Carnage’s team. Carnage faked his death but Spider-Man and Venom weren’t fooled. They followed Carnage until he could run no more, and they fought. Spider-Man was weak (he’d been fighting for days) and had to be saved by the Black Cat. Venom took the opportunity to push Carnage into an electrical generator and escape. Carnage was taken to jail and Venom was gone.Funeral PyreBack in San Francisco (under it actually) Venom was tasked with saving a reporter who had infiltrated the Jadoo, a local gang. For his initiation, the reporter had to murder someone, but he didn’t want to do it. Venom needed to save him before the initiation took place and the reporter could be found out. When Venom arrived in the gang’s area, he found Frank Castle, the Punisher, killing gang members left and right. He tried to stop Frank, telling him that he was trying to save someone, but the Punisher wouldn’t listen. The two fought and Venom won, but he had to leave because a gang war had begun.Meanwhile, the reporter that Venom had come to save, found the drug lab he had been looking for. Before he could do anything about it, he got dragged into the gang war. Punisher arrived in his van after recovering from his fight. Venom saw him and tried to attack him again, but was blasted by sonics from his van. While Venom was trapped by the constant barrage of sound, Punisher went to kill the gang members.In a display of enormous willpower, Venom got tentacle out of the range of the sonics and into the van to shut them off. Venom then went after gang members, questioning them and trying to find the reporter, a man named Gray. Venom didn’t find him in time, and Gray was forced to be part of a drive-by shooting. Venom did find the Punisher though, and he used his suit to protect him from bullets, placing Frank in his debt. Gary got back to the lab and used some Hydra technology to give himself energy powers. Angry at being forced to kill, Gray (now calling himself Pyre) struck out against everyone, Punisher, Venom and some Jadoo gang members nearby.Venom and Punisher escaped (separately) so they could come up with a way to beat Pyre. Punisher came crashing through the building in his van and shooting some kind of beam. The weapon didn’t stop Pyre, it just set everything on fire. Venom’s solution involved crashing something down on Pyre’s legs, but it was the only way. After stopping Pyre he tried to save him, but he couldn’t. Cops came and Venom had to leave. The last he saw, Pyre appeared to have died in the fire.Powers & Abilities StealthThe Venom symbiote is an alien that possesses various abilities. It requires a host body from which it absorbs adrenaline for fuel, but being symbiotic in nature (as opposed to parasitic like the rest of its race) it grants several abilities to its host. The symbiote increases all physical attributes of its host, such as strength, speed, agility, reflexes, stamina, durability and healing and brings them all to superhuman levels. It also affords special abilities that come solely from itself, including camouflage (and limited invisibility), shape shifting and slight mental abilities that let the symbiote and the host share memories and knowledge, as well as mimic (and block) Spider-Man's Spider Sense. In Planet Of The Symbiotes, the creature, after being rejected by its host, emits a psychic scream which has the effect of driving nearby humans to states of extreme depression. Later, with the assistance of Eddie Brock, it emits an even more powerful variant of that power which results in the mass suicide of an invasive force of symbiotes.After bonding with Spider-Man, the symbiote adopted some of his powers and can use them even though he no longer uses Peter as a host. The Symbiote grants the wearer Spider-man's abilities because Spider-man was the first person it had bonded with. In theory, if the symbiote bonded with, say Wolverine, it would most likely acquire his abilities and pass them on to it's other hosts. It can mimic Spider-Man's web-shooting abilities using materials created inside its own body. Since the webbing comes from itself it can run out and every so often it needs to generate more. It also developed ed Spider-Man's wall-crawling trick and can adhere to sheer surfaces.WeaknessesThe symbiote is vulnerable to fire and high-frequency sounds. These weaknesses aren't absolute though. Venom can resist the pain caused by fire or sonics when necessary, but they are a deterrent.Though the symbiote has rejected its species habit of consuming its hosts, it still requires certain chemicals found in living brain tissue (most likely phenethylamine) in order to survive. When starved of these chemicals, the symbiote develops a mutable exoskeleton, allowing it to form its own solid body which it uses to hunt and kill prey without the assistance of a host.