Warning: contains spoilers for Venom #29!
In the most recent arc of Venom, Eddie Brock, Venom, and Eddie’s son have been trapped in an alternate future where Eddie died before ever bonding with his symbiote other. This leads to the rise of the villain Codex and his hive mind army of symbiotes, taking over and assimilating the entire world as its dark ruler. However, Eddie, Venom, and Dylan weren’t the only ones who went though the portal to this bleak version of the future. A seemingly new villain, Virus, followed them, carrying quite the grudge against Eddie. However, Virus was just recently revealed to be none other than Mac Gargan, the super-villain Scorpion and former host of Venom. While Eddie and Mac have long been rivals, it seems as though they might have just found themselves in an old-fashioned team-up.
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Prior to Venom #29, from writer Donny Cates with art by Luke Ross, Virus was quickly captured by the symbiote Avengers and taken to Codex, who quickly determined his true identity as Mac Gargan. Codex gave him a new symbiote to bond with, turning him into a symbiote Scorpion, tasked with finding Eddie and Dylan, who had found refuge with the symbiote resistance movement led by Anne Weying. When the resistance was attacked by Codex’s forces, Eddie and Venom were able to repel them with relative ease with the help of their new allies, but Gargan and his new symbiote were not far behind.
Now, in Venom #29, Eddie and Venom face Gargan. After a brief brawl, Eddie and Venom get the upper hand on Mac. Eddie is understandably angry with Gargan, seeing as how it was his fault that they all got inadvertently sent to this dark future in the first place. However, Gargan counters by saying that Eddie paralyzed him. This is technically true. In the Absolute Carnage event, Venom threw Scorpion at Carnage, and Carnage almost took out Gargan’s spine. While first his cobbled-together armor as Virus, then his new symbiote from Codex, were keeping him mobile, he has been paralyzed ever since – a fact Eddie hadn’t realized. Finally seeing his error, Eddie decides to help Mac, provided Mac helps him and the resistance find Codex.
It’s a pretty interesting dynamic that Cates has now created between two of the deadliest hosts of Venom. Eddie and Gargan have been rivals and foes for a while now, so to see them making some kind of reconciliation and determining to work together is surprising. Who knows if it will last or if the animosity can ever go away completely? But for the time being, Eddie and Mac are allies looking to hopefully defeat Codex and find a way back to their own reality and timeline.
Donny Cates is pulling no punches with this “Venom Beyond” arc, completely changing the game and status quo for Venom, which is incredibly entertaining for fans of the Lethal Protector. Not only that, but this arc is doing wonders as a precursor to the King in Black event, coming at the end of this year, seeing Knull, the Symbiote God, finally coming to Earth to begin his invasion. Eddie and Venom are currently getting to see what could very well happen to their world should they fail against Knull. Here’s hoping the unlikely team-up between Venom and Scorpion will be enough defeat him.
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