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Venom (Eddie Brock)
Publisher Marvel Comics First appearance Amazing Spider-Man #252 (alien symbiote) Amazing Spider-Man #299 (partial appearance as Venom) Amazing Spider-Man #300 (full appearance as Venom) Created by David Michelinie Todd McFarlane
Characteristics Alter ego Edward Allan [1] Charles "Eddie" Brock Team affiliations Sinister Six Daily Globe Abilities Alien symbiote grants the host all of Spider-Man's powers as well other superhuman abilities; Superhuman strength, durability, reflexes, and agility Wall-Crawling Organic Webbing: unlike Spiderman's Shape-shifting Accelerated Healing factor Immunity to Spider-Man's "spider-sense"

Venom (Edward "Eddie" Charles Brock Junior), is a fictional character, a Marvel Comics supervillain and anti-hero generally credited to David Michelinie and Todd McFarlane. Brock is the most well-known host of the Venom symbiote and both are arch-enemies of Spider-Man. For much of the 1990s he was Spider-Man's most visible adversary. He made his first full appearance in The Amazing Spider-Man #299 (April 1988, see image below), and an immediate follow-up appearance in Amazing Spider-Man #300.

Venom is the result of symbiosis between the extraterrestrial "Venom" symbiote and Eddie Brock, a human host. Before this merger, Eddie was a journalist who held a personal grudge against Spider-Man, and the Venom symbiote was an alien life form that merged with Spider-Man, who managed to reject it when he realized that it was taking him over. Eddie Brock, as Venom, is one of the most well-known villains in both the Marvel universe and Spider-Man's rogue gallery. He appears as an antagonist in the film Spider-Man 3 and is portrayed by Topher Grace.

Contents 1 Publication history 2 Fictional character biography 2.1 Early life 2.2 Bonding with the symbiote 2.3 Progeny 2.4 Planet of the Symbiotes 2.5 Venom on Trial 2.6 Clone of the symbiote 2.7 Separation 3 Personality 4 Powers and abilities 5 Other versions 5.1 Ultimate Venom 5.1.1 Video game 5.1.2 Ultimates 3 5.1.3 Comparison to Earth-616 version 5.2 Marvel Zombies 5.3 What If? 6 In other media 6.1 Television 6.1.1 Spider-Man: The Animated Series 6.1.2 Spider-Man Unlimited 6.1.3 The Spectacular Spider-Man 6.2 Film 6.2.1 Spider-Man 3 6.3 Video games 7 References

Writer David Michelinie and artist Todd McFarlane are generally credited with the character's creation, based on a number of plot ideas and concepts from various other creators, though the degree to which McFarlane should be credited with co-creating the character has been a source of dispute in the comic book industry. Venom's existence was first indicated in Web of Spider-Man #18 (Sept. 1986), when he shoved Peter Parker in front of a subway train without Parker's spider-sense warning him, though only Brock's hand was seen on-panel. (It would later be established that the alien symbiote, having once been grafted to Parker, did not trigger his spider-sense.) The next indication of Venom's existence was in Web of Spider-Man #24 (March 1987), when Parker had climbed out of a high story window to change into Spider-Man, but found a black arm coming through the window and grabbing him, again without being warned by his spider-sense. He then made a partial appearance on the final page of The Amazing Spider-Man #298 (April 1988), in which he was obscured by shadow, before making his first full appearance on the final page of #299 (May 1988).

The question of who created the character of Venom became an issue of contention in 1993 when Michelinie wrote to the comic-book industry magazine Wizard, which had referred to Michelinie in issue #17 as "co-creator" of Venom. In his letter, printed in issue #21 (May 1993), Michelinie wrote that he was the character's sole creator, while saying also he believed that without McFarlane the character would not have attained the popularity it did. Michelinie pointed out that Venom's earliest appearances were in Web of Spider-Man #18 (Sept. 1986), written by Michelinie and drawn by Marc Silvestri; and Web of Spider-Man #24, plotted by Michelinie, scripted by Len Kaminski, and drawn by Del Barras.

The character would remain unseen and inactive until Amazing Spider-Man editor Jim Salicrup required a villain for that book's 300th issue, and Michelinie suggested a villain consisting of the alien symbiote grafted onto the body of a human female. Salicrup accepted the suggestion, but changed the character to a male. Michelinie then devised the Eddie Brock identity. Michelinie contends that the plots for issues #298-299, as well as the visual descriptions of the character, were written and bought by Salicrup before McFarlane was ever assigned to the book.

Writer Peter David corroborated Michelinie’s view in his "But I Digress" column in the June 4, 1993 Comics Buyer's Guide, in which he stated that Michelinie discussed the ideas behind the character with him at the time of its creation. At that time, David was the writer on The Spectacular Spider-Man and wrote the "Sin Eater" storyline from which Eddie Brock’s back story would be derived, well before McFarlane was assigned to the art duties on Amazing. Because artists who design the costumes or appearances of major characters and/or illustrate their first appearances are generally credited as co-creators, Venom represents a complex situation, because the costume from which Venom's appearance is derived was not designed by McFarlane. ^[2]

Erik Larsen, who followed McFarlane as artist on Amazing, and who added Venom's pointy teeth and tongue as well as the green drool to Venom's appearance, responded to Michelinie's letter with one of his own that was printed in Wizard #23 (July 1993), in which he dismissed Michelinie's contributions to the character, arguing that Michelinie merely "swiped" the preexisting symbiote and its powers to place it on a character whose motivations were poorly conceived, one-dimensional, unbelievable, and clichéd. Larsen also argued that it was McFarlane’s rendition of the character that made it commercial.^[3]

The preexisting elements that dealt with the symbiote costume itself - to which Michelinie did not contribute - have also been noted. For example, editor Jim Shooter came up with the idea of switching Spider-Man to a black-and-white costume, possibly influenced by the intended costume design for the new Spider-Woman. Artists Mike Zeck and Rick Leonardi, as well as others, designed the black-and-white costume. Writer/artist John Byrne asserts on his website that the idea for a costume made of self-healing biological material was one he originated when he was the artist on Iron Fist to explain how that character’s costume was constantly being torn and then apparently repaired by the next issue, explaining that he ended up not using the idea on that title, but that Roger Stern later asked him if he could use the idea for Spider-Man's alien costume. Stern in turn plotted the issue in which the costume first appeared but then left the title. It was writer Tom DeFalco and artist Ron Frenz who had established that the costume was a sentient alien being and also that it was vulnerable to high sonic energy during their run on The Amazing Spider-Man that preceded Michelinie's.^[4] Regardless, Peter David's position is that Michelinie is the sole creator, since the idea of creating a separate character using the alien symbiote was Michelinie’s, as was Eddie Brock's backstory, and that without the idea to create such a character, the character would not have existed.^[5]

This dispute arose at a time when artists such as McFarlane and Larsen were enjoying a great deal of popularity and clout with readers, and capitalizing on their popularity by publishing creator-owned books with their new company, Image Comics, and it is possible that this issue was a subtext of the greater debate over the importance of writers versus artists that was being waged in the industry at the time. Prior to McFarlane's departure from Marvel, the company stated that Venom was a creation of McFarlane's, and Michelinie shared credit as co-creator.^{[citation needed]} Regardless of the issues surrounding his creation, Venom was created under a work for hire contract and Marvel owns all rights to the character.

Throughout most of his career in print, Brock's sole motivation for hating Spider-Man was because the webslinger's capture of the villain Sin Eater exposed the man who had previously confessed to Brock to being responsible for the Sin Eater's crimes as a compulsive confessor, thus destroying Brock's credibility and reputation as a journalist. The symbiote was attracted to Brock's hatred. In 2003, writer Paul Jenkins, in the second volume of Spectacular Spider-Man, revealed Brock had cancer and the symbiote was attracted to it because it released adrenaline, which the symbiote fed off of. In the same comic, there were alot of victims (who were cancer patients) who suffered identical injuries - Venom sucked out their energy from the adrenal gland. The symbiote's feeding of the cancer kept Brock alive and his hatred of Spider-Man stemmed from the fear that Spider-Man would accept the symbiote back, leaving him to be taken by the cancer.

Born in San Francisco, Edward Allan Charles Brock was raised in a Roman Catholic upbringing by a cold and unloving father who blamed him for his wife's death in childbirth. Though he desperately sought his father's approval and excelled in many subjects, particularly athletics, his father's response was always in the form of half-hearted encouragements. After reading a newspaper article on the Watergate scandal in college, Brock quit athletics and switched his major to journalism.

Upon graduating, he moved to New York City and obtained a job at the Daily Globe, a rival of the Daily Bugle. He proved himself to be highly talented, though even this could not get his father's approval.^[6] At some point in his career, he married Anne Weying. She was apparently attracted by his wit and gentility, traits he had always hidden from his father.

Brock's life takes a turn for the worse when he is diagnosed with cancer and is told by his doctor that he does not have long to live. Hoping to make the best of his last days and take his mind off the cancer, Brock buries himself in his work. He begins to investigate a series of murders perpetrated by a serial killer nicknamed the Sin-Eater, and surprisingly finds someone actually confessing to the murders. Brock interviews the man and The Globe's popularity soars. However, with the authorities pressing for a suspect, he is forced to reveal his subject's identity. To his horror, it turns out that Spider-Man had caught the real killer and the man he had been interviewing was nothing more than a compulsive confessor. Brock is fired from his job in disgrace, and his father practically disowns him. With no decent publishers willing to hire him, he is forced to work for sleazy tabloid magazines. Now with his fear of the cancer growing, Brock resumes his passion for athletics through weight training to reduce stress. Though his body grows to near-Olympic standards, his anger and depression remained. Tiring of her husband's incessant brooding, Anne divorces him. With both his professional and personal life shattered, Brock contemplates suicide and goes to Our Lady of Saints Church where he prays to God for forgiveness, unaware the symbiote Spider-Man had discarded is waiting for him.

Attracted by the adrenaline caused by his cancer, the symbiote bonds with Brock, feeding off the cancer and keeping him alive. It also gives him superhuman strength, speed, reflexes, agility, and an ability to cling to any surface; all powers that it received from Spider-Man. Grateful for the power it gave him and for stopping the cancer from killing him, Brock accepts the symbiote. However, he knows that the symbiote thinks of him as a second rate meal compared to Spider-Man and thus Brock turns the wallcrawler into his personal demon, knowing that as long as he lives, there is a chance he will accept the symbiote back, leaving Brock to die. The symbiote takes advantage of Brock's hatred, since it is still angry at Spider-Man for rejecting it. The symbiote imparts him with the knowledge of Spider-Man's secret identity, and Brock names himself "Venom" ("For that's what I'm paid to spew out these days") and torments Spider-Man and his family.^[7]

Main article: Carnage (comics)

Venom is subdued and incarcerated when the plague-spreading supervillain, Styx, renders the symbiote unconscious.^[8]The symbiote finds and bonds with Brock, aiding in his escape. During the escape, the symbiote reproduces, and its offspring bonds to Brock's cellmate Cletus Kasady, creating Carnage. He is also hired to take down the hero Quesar, but is defeated.

Venom later abducts Spider-Man, and takes him to a remote island. Spider-Man fakes his death to convince Venom that his vendetta is over, and Venom resigns himself to life on the island.^[9]Venom's "retirement" ends when Spider-Man, unable to defeat Carnage, returns to enlist Venom's aid.^[10] In the 1993 Spider-Man crossover storyline "Maximum Carnage", Venom teams up with Spider-Man and a number of other heroes to defeat Carnage when he and a team of powerful supervillains take over New York City. His willingness to kill the villains causes a deep rift with many of his allies, who only wish to subdue them.

Having made peace with Spider-Man after he rescued Brock's ex-wife, Venom moves back to Brock's hometown of San Francisco, where he acts as the protector of an underground society descended from survivors of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. Venom continues his mission of protecting innocent people, though he made mistakes along the way. For example, he believes he is killing a corrupt businessman but instead accidentally slays a cleaning lady who is enjoying a break in her boss' chair. Venom also works to protect the underground society from exploitation on the part of business concerns who cared nothing about killing. Also, during this time, he has a brief relationship with a woman named Beck. This lady and several other members of the society under his protection are taken hostage by alien-afflicted mercenaries known as 'Stalkers'. Venom teams up with the mystical antihero known as Vengeance in a rescue attempt. Most of the hostages escape before Venom and his ally have to personally fight to save Beck and another woman who had feelings for Brock.

His career as a lethal protector is cut short when the Spider-Man clone Ben Reilly hunts him down and separates Brock from the symbiote after an intense battle.

Five other spawns of Venom are created by the Life Foundation, to act as "super-cops" for its planned fallout shelter society. Due to his past experiences with Carnage, Venom assumes the rest of his progeny (the Life Foundation symbiotes Scream, Lasher, Riot, Phage, and Agony) would turn out the same way, and thus should be destroyed. However, the Life Foundation symbiotes were afraid of becoming like Carnage, and instead wanted Venom's help controlling their symbiotes so they could use them for good. Even though the Life Foundation symbiotes rescue him from imprisonment, Brock refuses to help them and Scream goes insane and kills them (Venom: Separation Anxiety #4). When Scream later reforms, she helps Venom several times. The remains of the other four symbiotes merge to form Hybrid, who considers Venom a threat.

For a while, Brock begins to doubt the nobility of his cause and temporarily abandons his alien other. The telepathically projected grief of the symbiote attracts a scouting party of other members of its own species which begins possessing people and forcing them to steal the material needed to create a portal to their home world. When the portal opens, the symbiotes invade New York, taking over the bodies of civilians and superheroes alike. Brock rejoins with the Venom symbiote to assist Spider-Man and Ben Reilly in fighting the other symbiotes. Venom convinces the heroes to distract the symbiotes while he concentrates on creating a "psychic scream" that would render the invaders unconscious. To Spider-Man and Ben's horror, however, the attack actually kills every alien symbiote on the planet.

Brock is captured in his sewer hideout and put on trial, with Matt Murdock acting in his defense,^[11] and his symbiote held in check with a chemical inhibitor. Carnage is called as a witness, but he overcame his own inhibitor and attacked. Venom, Spider-Man, and Daredevil teamed up and subdued Carnage. However, before the trial could continue, Venom is unexpectedly taken into custody by a secret government organization who offered him amnesty if he joined them as an agent. Though Venom at first relished his new found immunities, he left after being abandoned during a dangerous mission.^[12] This would lead to Eddie Brock being given selective amnesia from a head wound and later being separated from the symbiote, which is presumed killed by the government Overreach Committee^[13].

The symbiote in fact survives and tracks down the amnesiac Brock, turning him into Venom again. Venom then infiltrates Ravencroft prison, slaughters the guards, and temporarily absorbs the Carnage symbiote. He joins the Sinister Six, but turns on the other members after they mock him, crippling Sandman and Electro before making peace with Spider-Man.

Like all prior agreements with Spider-Man, this peace is short-lived, as Venom's hatred for Spider-Man is renewed when Anne Weying, driven over the edge by fear of her husband, committed suicide after seeing Spider-Man in his black suit. Venom loses his chance for revenge when the powerful human/alien hybrid Senator Ward forcefully removes the symbiote from Brock once more.

The Carnage symbiote gives birth to the Toxin symbiote. Carnage attempts to kill the newborn Toxin, but Venom opposes him until he realizes that Toxin's policeman host would not ally with him. Venom calls a truce with Carnage in order to destroy Toxin, who is aided by Spider-Man. Spider-Man and Toxin drive Carnage and Venom away.^[14]

An alien race, secretly operating within the United States government, clones the Venom symbiote. Venom absorbs the clone, gains its knowledge, and decides to carry out the aliens' orders.^[15] Before he does, however, Brock knows that he will die if he does not permanently bond with the symbiote.^[16] The Symbiote rejects Brock, not desiring to be bonded with a diseased body anymore. Ultimately, Spider-Man tricks the symbiote into permanently merging with Brock.^[17]

After bonding once more with the symbiote, Brock has a religious awakening and decides against permanently merging with the symbiote. Brock instead chooses to sell the symbiote to crimelord Don Fortunato, intending to donate the $100 million received to charity before dying.^[18] Angelo Fortunato, the Don's son, became the second Venom for a brief period of time. However, Angelo began killing innocent people in his quest for glory and later proved to be a weak host for the Symbiote, being humiliated in a battle with Spider-Man. The symbiote abandons Angelo mid-leap, and the subsequent fall kills Fortunato. The symbiote then becomes attached to Mac Gargan, better known as the Scorpion at the time, and is currently still with him as he is now a member of the Thunderbolts. When Peter Parker unmasks himself publicly as Spider-Man, Brock is among the millions of witnesses. He is shown in the hospital, rapidly succumbing physically to his cancer and experiencing hallucinations of the symbiote, representing his dark side. He spots Mary Jane Watson Parker watching over Aunt May, who has been seriously wounded by a bullet. Brock has no idea what to do, but his dark side then persuades him to order a black suit similar to Peter's and put it on.

Making a decision to go and try to murder Aunt May while she's in a coma, Brock orders a dress-up costume of Spider-Man's black costume and sets out to kill her, first murdering a nurse for getting in his way. At the last minute, however, he has a change of heart, finding he could not murder someone as innocent as Aunt May. Peter enters the room moments later to find Brock sitting on the shattered window, and having slit his own wrists dozens of times to get rid of Venom, telling Peter that he [Brock] has done too many terrible things to keep living. He jumps out the window, but Peter breaks his fall by catching him with two strands of webbing. Awakening chained to his bed, Brock decides to take better control of himself in the short time he has left. He tells his dark side that it's all right if they are together forever, as long as they know that Eddie Brock is in charge.

Unlike most of Spider-Man's enemies, Venom has little interest in wealth, money, or power: he only wants to kill Spider-Man. A major theme of Eddie Brock's villainy (or anti-heroism) is protecting the innocent. His usage of lethal force in his battle against crime is often compared with The Punisher. Though both view murder as an acceptable method of crime fighting, there are several differences between the two. Unlike the Punisher, who does what he perceives as his duty with emotional detachment, Venom makes little effort of hiding the obvious glee he experiences in terrifying and butchering those he considers guilty. It is hinted in various Spider-Man novels that the Venom willingly threatens to (and actually does) eat those he deems guilty. Unlike the Punisher, whose sole goal in life is to track down and destroy criminals, Venom does not actively seek them. He is much more concerned about protecting the victims of crime rather than focusing solely on eliminating the perpetrators.^[19]

Eddie isn't always consistent with his methods, though some times he recognizes the inconsistency. He deeply regretted having to kill one of the guards when he escaped the Vault the first time, even giving the dead man a parting platonic kiss. Eddie doesn't always recognize his methods are flawed. He once 'rescued' a little girl from a clown he thought was threatening her. Eddies fearsome appearance caused by the symbiote, with his huge tongue and long teeth, terrified the girl, rendering her mute for some time afterwards.

He has repeatedly shown himself able to perform heroic feats, ranging from saving people falling from buildings^[20] to throwing himself in front of bullets. This has been used against him, as some of his opponents know he will let them escape in order to rescue an innocent civilian.

Venom considers his methods and willingness to kill as a more efficient means of crime-fighting than his contemporary, Spider-Man. During the Maximum Carnage storyline, there are several occasions where Spider-Man's moral inhibitions cause him to physically prevent Venom from finishing a defeated or disadvantaged Carnage, usually leading to Carnage's escape or recovery. Venom's opinion, that Carnage only "feels alive when he's taking lives" has been proven correct by the number of times Kasady has escaped from custody and went on to murder more innocents.

Before his religious re-awakening, Brock showed himself to be prone to extremely violent mood swings whenever separated from his other, showing none of the joviality displayed when fighting as Venom. In fact, he'd even brood over his crimes, expressing a great deal of guilt until once again being rejoined and once again becoming the lethal protector.^[21]

Even after their divorce, Eddie was totally devoted to his wife Anne, the first person to have ever treated him with the affection he never received from his father. Though he did once find himself in the position to start a new relationship, he never followed through with it, stating that he was "too dangerous" to romantically commit himself.^[22] However, he did try several times to rekindle his relationship with Anne, until her death, which left him devastated.

Because the Venom symbiote and Eddie Brock are two separate entities that have bonded together, Venom often refers to itself as "We" rather than "I." Venom is an amalgam of Brock and the Venom symbiote, creating a new being while keeping the previous two beings intact. Though they agree on many things (initial hatred for Spider-Man, protection of the innocent, etc.), they are not as in sync as Cletus Kasady and the Carnage symbiote, who refers to itself in the singular.

Upon his entry into hospital life, Brock was depressed, while trying to fend off his murderous side. After murdering a nurse and almost attacking Peter Parker's aunt, he was overwhelmed by remorse and was able to take control.

See also: Symbiote (comics)

As a result of the Venom symbiote's former host, Spider-Man, it grants its hosts abilities parallel to those of the wall-crawler (i.e. superhuman strength, agility, and reflexes, and the ability to adhere to walls). However, the Venom symbiote does not appear to have inherited its former host's "Spider Sense".

The Venom symbiote is capable of enhancing the strength of its host to varying degrees. Due to Eddie Brock's muscular physique and natural physical strength from weight-training, his strength as Venom is superhuman, superior to that of Spider-Man before the recent increase in some of Spider-Man's powers. Although the Venom symbiote gives Eddie Brock enhanced agility, his speed and reflexes are not as great as Spider-Man's. Venom has demonstrated strength ranging from only slightly greater than Spider-Man's to level of strength rivaling vastly powerful beings such as the Juggernaut, Hulk or Superman.

Venom's body is highly resistant to physical injury, capable of withstanding assault from high-caliber weapons as well as attacks from super powered beings or powerful expolosions. The Venom suit also protects Brock from any type of extremely sticky substance. Venom is also capable of surviving in harmful areas for long periods of time such as underwater or in toxic gases, the Venom symbiote filtering breathable air to the host. Additionally, the symbiote is capable of healing injuries in the host at a vastly faster rate than normal human healing allows. The symbiote is also capable of healing injuries and illness that current human medical care cannot.

The Venom symbiote contains a small 'dimensional aperture', similar to a pocket, that allows the host to carry items upon his/her person without adding mass to the costume. It also possesses some limited psychic ability, making it capable of obtaining information from its hosts and even other people and symbiotes simply by touch. This ability allowed Eddie Brock to know the secret identity of Spider-Man when the symbiote bonded with him. It can, however, be forced to forget information if the symbiote is inflicted with heavy trauma. The Venom symbiote is also capable of psychically detecting its offspring; however, this ability can be blocked.

Due to Spider-Man being a host to the Venom symbiote, Venom, and as a result his offspring, are able to bypass Spider-Man's spider-sense. As such, Venom is capable of attacking Spider-Man without alerting him.

The Venom symbiote is capable of mimicking the appearance of any form of clothing, camouflaging with its surroundings, and even mimicking other people, therefore it can even make itself and its host invisible.

The Venom suit can also shoot webbing similar to that of Spider-Man, albeit from the back of the host's hand instead of the wrist, but as this is made from the symbiote itself, overuse slightly weakens it. However, the symbiote is still capable of producing vast amounts of this webbing before it is forced to stop. Furthermore, it does have an upper limit as to how much webbing it can produce. In Amazing Spider-Man vol. 1, #300, Spider-Man defeats Venom by forcing the symbiote to continually fire off its webbing, after correctly deducing that it uses its own substance to create it. In addition to using the suit as webbing, the symbiote has also been used in the form of tendrils and tentacles to attack.

The Venom symbiote is particularly vulnerable to high-pitched sonics and fire.

Though it hasn't been fully explained, Venom is immune to Ghost Rider's penance stare.^[23]

Eddie Brock's tenacity and the Venom symbiote's disposition to brutality are both a gift and a curse in combat. Venom's fighting style does not incorporate agility or subtlety as much as Spider-Man's, often relying on frontal assaults that usually leave him and his opponents injured. Despite this and a seeming disregard for his personal safety, Venom has proven himself to be a very deadly fighter. He has been seen defeating enemies theoretically stronger and faster than himself, such as Superman, Juggernaut or Carnage during the Maximum Carnage storyline.

See also: Venom (comics)

In Ultimate Spider-Man, Eddie Brock, Jr. is Peter Parker's closest childhood friend. Instead of a sentient alien, the Venom symbiote is a genetically-engineered protoplasmic "suit" designed by Peter's father, Richard, and Eddie's father, Edward Brock, Sr. Richard intends it to be used for medical purposes in his quest to cure cancer but Brock, Sr. is more interested in the military applications of the suit.

After the deaths of both men, Eddie continues the research. Peter Parker meets up with Eddie and the pair bond over their shared history before Eddie informs Peter of their legacy. Peter returns at night, determined to continue his father's research by taking a sample, but it instead bonds with him. After nearly being driven to murder by the suit (and even momentarily becomes Venom), Peter warns Eddie of its danger and takes the sample to an industrial smoke stack where he destroys it. Eddie, after having his romantic intentions rejected by Gwen Stacy, becomes furious with Peter when he caught him destroying their "inheritance". Eddie then uses a second sample of the suit but the suit takes full control of Eddie, transforming him into the large, strong, power-hungry, symbiote monster known as Venom. Eddie, as Venom, viciously attacks Peter at his high school in the football field. After the fight, Venom disappears after being electrocuted by some power cables in contact with water on a street while being shot by two policemen.

Later, in the Ultimate Spider-Man video game, Eddie has apparently survived and gains full control of the Venom suit after he absorbs the remnants of the first sample in Peter's blood. In doing so, he develops the familiar white spider symbol on his chest. In Ultimate Spider-Man, Venom is much more physically powerful than Spider-Man, although he is not as fast or agile. On one rare occasion Spider-Man was able to defeat Venom using his speed, and a well-placed uppercut. He cannot create organic webbing, instead using extruded tentacles to swing from building to building. Nor does he have the cloaking ability.

He could also grab any human around him and consume their life force, then spitting out the drained body (this was how to restore health as Venom in Ultimate Spider-Man). He was not weakened by sound but electricity was strong against him and the suit drains Brock so much he must consume life force to stay in check. In the Ultimate Spider-Man video game, he quickly leaps from building to building, jumping several hundred feet in a single bound. "Ultimate Venom", unlike the "Amazing" Venom, not only activates Peter Parker's spider-sense, but overloads it to the point that Peter is in such pain that he's paralyzed.

It is revealed that the dormant suit particles in Peter's blood want to join with Venom which is what causes the pain, but stops and doesn't happen again after Venom absorbs the particles from Peter and gains control over the suit. Unlike the Venom from "The Amazing Spider-Man", Ultimate Venom is not specifically vulnerable to sonics or fire, nor is he particularly concerned about killing innocent bystanders. In fact, the suit appears to be weak against electricity (Peter jumped onto a powerline to stop it from eating him when he was wearing it and Venom disappeared for 3 months after stepping on a livewire. Electro also mentions this when testing the suit for Trask Industries.) and the only way to prevent the suit from consuming Eddie is to allow the suit to "feed" on the random humans around Venom. (However, when Spider-Man took the suit, even though it tried to take over his mind and body, it can be safely assumed that due to Peter's father's DNA in the suit, it became more stable and didn't need to feed on outside sources.)

He next appears in Ultimates 3 attacking the Ultimates at their mansion looking for an (as yet) unrevealed female. He starts by attacking Thor, which plows into their mansion. Hawkeye and Panther fight back, and Panther is knocked far away by Venom. Valkyrie joins the fight, and along with Wasp they hold Venom off until Thor can summon a bolt of electricity into Eddie, who turns into some sort of goo. The white spider symbol is now present on his chest due to his reabsorbing of the final symbiote particles in Peter's bloodstream in the Ultimate Spider-man video game which was intended as canon.^[24]

Eddie Brock Jr. is one of the most heavily modified characters in the Ultimate Marvel universe, bearing little similarities to his classic Marvel counterpart. Compared to the original character, Eddie Brock Jr. is a young, scientifically minded and thinly built man. The suit is also different appearing more purple than Earth-616's Venom in which the suit is given a dark blue hue. The color of the Venom symbiote is actually black in every incarnation and the colors given in addition to the black were added to make Venom more visible in a dark environment such as an alleyway or at night. He does, however, retain the original's vindictiveness and obsessiveness. His vengeful vendetta and his belief that Parker has betrayed him and that he must pay because he is evil. During the "Double Trouble" story arc, a reporter named Eddie Brock was seen at a press conference held by Justin Hammer. Though his face was never shown, he was asking questions for the Daily Globe. He does not appear to be connected in any way with the Eddie Brock who becomes Venom - this may simply be an example of a character being inserted into the Ultimate Marvel universe before his backstory was fully fleshed out. The Spider-Man 3 film version of Eddie Brock seems to be based on an amalgam of "Ultimate" Eddie and the "Amazing" Eddie. His build, name,^[25] and romantic interests are all shared with Ultimate Eddie, while his occupation (connection to journalism) and his history and jealous motivations are drawn from the "Amazing" version.^[26]

See also: Marvel Zombies

Venom appears in the Marvel Zombies mini-series where an alternate Earth is over-run with a virus that turns people, namely most of the heroes and villains, into zombies. In this reality, Eddie's body is a rotting carcass and no longer a suitable host, causing the symbiote to begin to die as there are no normal humans left for it to take. Eddie loses his "edge" thereafter, and Zombie Spider-Man kills him. The fate of the symbiote is unknown, but the organism is presumed dead, as the Earth is later described as devoid of all "intelligent life".

In the story "What If? The Punisher Kills the Marvel Universe", Venom appears chasing Spider-Man through the New York sewers; after being near-lethally electrocuted by a trap set by the Punisher, the Venom symbiote is stunned, leaving a delirious and incapacitated Eddie Brock to be shot repeatedly by the Punisher, who also blows up his body, apparently killing the weakened symbiote which was still covering a portion of Brock.

Like the comics' version of Venom, the version in this 1990s cartoon is a former reporter named Eddie Brock who becomes bonded to an alien symbiote that was once attached to Spider-Man. The symbiote's origin is altered however, the alien being brought to Earth from a Moon-based space exploration. During their return, the astronauts are assaulted by the symbiote and crash their ship in the center of New York where Spider-Man arrives to help, inadvertently collecting the Symbiote when he leaves. Brock, in the meantime, tries to sell Jameson photos of Spider-Man robbing the shuttle, until the now black-suited Spider-Man exposes Brock for a fake again. Spidey and Jameson team up to rescue Jameson's son from the Kingpin, and Eddie tries to intervene. Caught up in his negative emotions, Spider-Man webs up Eddie and hangs him from the chruch bell, telling him he'll have him for dessert after he is finished with Shocker, the "main course." Realizing that the symbiote's benefits are outweighed by the negative emotions it is creating in him, Spider-Man uses the sound of bells in a church tower to force it to leave his body where it bonds with a webbed-up Brock hanging below. Despite the fact that he is a popular character, Venom was only featured in a handful of episodes. In "Carnage", when Carnage tries to take Ashley with him as he is being sucked into an interdimensional portal, Venom tackles Carnage, causing him to lose his grip on Ashley. As he is being sucked into the portal with Carnage, and he disappears into the alternate dimension forever.

Both Brock and Venom were voiced by Hank Azaria.

Venom makes several appearances in the show Spider-Man Unlimited. He and Carnage are attempting to conquer Counter-Earth with an invasion of symbiotes, which, unlike the Venom and Carnage symbiotes, simply possess people rather than bond with them. Venom was voiced by Brian Drummond. This series ignores largely all of Venom's origin from Spider-Man: The Animated Series and retcons most of it; additionally, in Spider-Man Unlimited Brock and the symbiote have fused almost perfectly, resulting in Venom having a more monstrous form, and if they were to be separated, both would die in the span of hours.

Eddie Brock will appear in the Spectacular Spider-Man, due out in 2008. He will be Curt Connors' assistant and will have closer ties to Peter Parker. He will become Venom in the final arc of the first season and will be a major threat to Spider-Man.^[27]

Venom's first appearance in a motion picture was originally planned for a titular film written by David S. Goyer and produced by New Line Cinema, in which Venom would have been portrayed as an anti-hero, and Carnage the antagonist. Goyer said in an interview the film rights to Venom ultimately reverted to Sony.^[28]

Producer and former Marvel Comics executive Avi Arad said in an interview that he plans to produce a Venom movie. It is unknown if Topher Grace will reprise his role.

Topher Grace plays Venom in the 2007 feature film Spider-Man 3. In the film, Edward "Eddie" Brock, Jr. is a new freelance photographer vying for a staff position with newspaper the Daily Bugle.

Eddie Brock is portrayed as a complete parallel to the normally modest and down-to-earth Peter Parker. Shallow, superficial and vindictive, Brock is also an insufferable flirt and has no regrets about cheating to get what he wants. He claims to be dating Gwen Stacy at the beginning of the movie, but much to his chagrin she does not consider herself his girlfriend. Although they only had one coffee date, Brock is smitten.

He sucks up to the Bugle publisher J. Jonah Jameson to get a job on the paper. After Jameson instructs Brock and Parker to obtain unflattering pictures of Spider-Man, Brock provides a manipulated picture of Spider-Man robbing a bank whilst wearing the black suit taken with a digital camera (he had a regular one, but Spider-Man broke it). Furious and spurred by the malign influence of the symbiote, Parker exposes Brock's duplicity, and an enraged Jameson fires him. After witnessing him dating Gwen, a miserable Brock goes to church and asks God to kill Peter Parker for ruining his life. Hearing the church bells tolling, he enters the belltower to find Spider-Man struggling to remove the symbiote, exposing himself to be Peter Parker.

The sound of the bells aggravates the symbiote enough to detach from Peter, but as it falls it latches onto Brock and he transforms into the monstrous Venom (his name is never said in the film), allowing him to gain many of Peter's superhuman abilities, as well as those of the symbiote.

Venom's appearance was slightly redesigned for the film. Instead of a solid black with a large white spider at the center, here the suit seems like a distorted mold-replica of Peter's original Spider-Man suit, having a faint, disorganized webbing pattern on it, and not being as large. In the comics Venom and Eddie Brock were portrayed as being highly muscular to an almost exaggerated degree, whereas in the movie, he has only a slightly larger muscle mass of Spider-Man. He also refers to himself as "I" instead of "We". Venom's voice was also portrayed as being only slightly deeper than Topher Grace's natural pitch, as opposed to most previous media portrayals he was given a distorted monstrous voice. Some fans were displeased as well that the film version of Venom lacked the long snake-like tongue and oozing green saliva that characterized the comic depiction of the character, but it must be noted these features were not present in the character's original Todd McFarlane design.

Venom recruits Sandman, who is on the run from Spider-Man, to help finish off the superhero. Venom and Sandman hold Peter Parker's girlfriend Mary Jane Watson hostage at a construction site to lure Parker to them. Parker arrives and fights Venom and tries to dodge an enlarged Sandman. He eventually assisted by his friend/former nemesis Harry Osborn. With the help of Peter, Harry manages to subdue Sandman with his Goblin arsenal and rescue Mary Jane. Peter then searches for Venom inside the building, but is brutally subdued by the villain. In an attempt to kill Parker, Venom impales and mortally wounds Harry with his own spiked glider, mirroring his father's death.

Peter temporarily traps Venom in a circle of upright metal pipes, ringing them at a frequency that subdues the symbiote. As the symbiote detaches from Brock, Parker extracts him from the symbiote with his webbing. The now-separated symbiote then begins to grow taller and expand itself. Parker subdues it again by ringing the pipes and then proceeds to throw one of Harry's pumpkin bombs at it in an attempt to annihilate it, but Brock, still craving the symbiote's power as if it were crack, dives into the circle and merges with the symbiote as the bomb explodes. When the smoke clears no remains are seen.

Many fan reactions were mixed on weather he died or not, in August a Venom spin-off was announced by Avi Arad, This had fueled speculation of both the symbiote's and his survival.

• The Amazing Spider-Man (Game Boy)
• The Amazing Spider-Man vs. The Kingpin (Sega Master System, Game Gear, Sega Genesis, Sega CD)
• Spider-Man: The Animated Series (Sega Genesis)
• Spider-Man (SNES)
• Spider-Man and Venom: Maximum Carnage (Sega Genesis, SNES)
• Spider-Man and Venom: Separation Anxiety (Sega Genesis, SNES, PC)
• Spider-Man: Lethal Foes (Super Nintendo)
• Spider-Man (PC, PlayStation, Nintendo 64, Dreamcast)
• Marvel vs. Capcom: Clash of Super Heroes (Dreamcast, PlayStation, Arcade)
• Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes (Dreamcast, PlayStation 2, Xbox, Arcade)
• Marvel Nemesis: Rise of the Imperfects (Nintendo DS, PlayStation Portable, PlayStation 2, Xbox, GameCube)
• Ultimate Spider-Man (Nintendo DS, Game Boy Advance, GameCube, PlayStation 2, PC, Xbox, Mobile)
• Spider-Man arcade game
• Spider-Man 3 (PlayStation 2, Wii, Nintendo DS, PlayStation Portable, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC) as the final boss. The fight with him is played out differently on each version of the game, with different endings: in the PC, PS3, and XBox 360 version, Venom is impaled on a spike, and in the PS2 and Wii versions, Venom is simply knocked out when Spider-Man defeats him.
• In the game, Marvel: Ultimate Alliance, Spider-Man has the symbiote as an unlockable costume (PlayStation 2,3, and Portable; PC, Xbox, Xbox 360, Game Boy Advance, Wii). Venom himself now is a playable character in the Xbox 360 expansion pack (as well as the "Gold Edition" released in May 2007) voiced by Steven Blum. Both Angelo Fortunado (referred to as "Marvel Knights"), Mac Gargan (referred to as "Thunderbolts"), and the Ultimate Venom forms serve as Venom's alternate costume. Venom has special dialogue with Mysterio and Rhino.
• Venom is playable in Spider-Man: Friend or Foe (PlayStation 2, Xbox 360, Wii, Nintendo DS, PlayStation Portable, PC) voiced by Quinton Flynn.
• Venom appeared in the game "The Battle Within" as the final boss in the game.

v • d • e Spider-Man
Publications	Main: Amazing Fantasy · The Amazing Spider-Man · Marvel Team-Up · The Spectacular Spider-Man · Web of Spider-Man · Peter Parker: Spider-Man · The Sensational Spider-Man · Spider-Man's Tangled Web · The Sensational Spider-Man (vol. 2) · Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man Other: Ultimate Spider-Man · Marvel Adventures Spider-Man · Spider-Man 2099 · Spider-Girl · Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane · Spidey Super Stories
Television	Spider-Man (1967) · Spidey Super Stories (1974, live action) · Amazing Spider-Man (1978, live action) · Supaidāman (1978, Japanese) · Spider-Man (1981) · Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends (1981) · Spider-Man (1994) · Spider-Man Unlimited (1999) · Spider-Man: The New Animated Series (2003) · The Spectacular Spider-Man (2008)
Films	Spider-Man (2002) · Spider-Man 2 (2004) · Spider-Man 3 (2007)
Supporting characters	Mary Jane Watson · Harry Osborn · May Parker · Ben Parker · Black Cat · J. Jonah Jameson · Gwen Stacy · Liz Allan · Betty Brant · Joseph Robertson · John Jameson · Ben Reilly · Jessica Drew · Mattie Franklin · Flash Thompson · Madame Web · Silver Sable
Villains	Carnage · Chameleon · Dr. Octopus · Eddie Brock · Electro · Green Goblin · Hobgoblin · The Jackal · Kingpin · Kraven the Hunter · The Lizard · Morbius · Mysterio · The Rhino · Sandman · Scorpion · The Shocker · Venom · The Vulture
Other topics	Fictional character biography · Supporting characters · Spider-Man villains · Spider-Man's powers and equipment · Video games · Alternate versions · Spider-Man in other media  · Daily Bugle