VENOM #7 REVIEW

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VENOM #7
“Spider-Island” Part 2
WRITER: Rick Remender
ARTIST: Tom Fowler
COLOR ARTIST: John Rauch
LETTERING/PRODUCTION: VC’s Joe Caramagna
COVER ART: Tony Moore & John Rauch

PLOT:

In the midst of the Spider-Island disaster, a man’s infected daughter mutates into a spider-monster in pink pajamas. He takes the girl to Our Lady of Saints Church to visit Eddie Brock, faith healer. Calling himself “the hand of God,” Eddie uses his Anti-Venom powers to cleanse victims of the spider-plague.

In her hideout, The Queen learns of Eddie’s interference and sends her henchman, Spider-King, to kill him. Unbeknownst to her, Spider-King is secretly Flash Thompson using the symbiote to disguise himself. Flash phones the army headquarters, telling them about Eddie. Upon seeing Brock, the symbiote almost makes Flash shoot him. Brock senses the symbiote’s presence, however, and the two battle on the streets. Seeking to kill the symbiote with his Anti-Venom powers, Eddie eventually gets the upper hand, but the symbiote leaps off Flash and tries to bond with Eddie. With his powers sapped from curing the spider-people, Brock can’t fight off the symbiote and they merge into Venom. Flash calls to the symbiote, telling it that Brock will always fight it but Flash will always need it. Flash convinces himself that he’s lying to the symbiote in order to tame it. The symbiote rejoins Flash and they leave Eddie at Reed Richards’s lab so Reed can analyze the cure in Anti-Venom’s blood.

Flash gets to his father’s hospital in time for some “I always really loved you,” “I’ll try to remember the good times,” yadda yadda yada. Then Flash’s dad croaks.

THOUGHTS:

First of all, it disappoints me how inaccessible Marvel made this issue to readers not following the “Spider-Island” storyline in The Amazing Spider-Man. In an earlier letter’s column, Spider-Editor and friend of the site Stephen Wacker said the following: “Venom is a big part of SPIDER-ISLAND, but not quite as tightly as you suggest. You can still read just Venom and understand the main story.” In reality, people reading just Venom (like me) can expect massive plot gaps between issues. Venom #6 ended with the Spider-Island mastermind still a mystery that Flash intended to solve by posing as the Spider-King and tracing the infestation to its source. Venom #7 starts with Flash having not only identified The Queen as the mastermind, but having already fully infiltrated her operation. The comic never recaps how this happened. Furthermore, the book gives Venom readers no clues about where The Queen came from, what her goals are, and why Miles Warren and his clones serve her.

And that reminds me . . . The Queen? Now there’s a character I needed to see again. #sarcasm

Everything good about this issue has to fit around the confusion and suffers for it. Take the death of Flash’s father. That should have been some heartbreaking, Eisner-worthy stuff, especially after the genius Venom #5, but it gets sandwiched in the middle of an Amazing Spider-Man event crossover, leaving it with only two pages in which to play out. Rushed and forced into limited space, Flash’s reconciliation with his father rings untrue and contrived. Frankly, I would have found it more interesting had Flash arrived too late to catch his father’s passing because his responsibilities as a hero–and his addiction to wearing the symbiote–called him elsewhere. 

I mostly liked Venom’s battle with Anti-Venom. Eddie knows what Flash is going through because Eddie has been there. When Eddie says “everything you’ve done since putting on that suit has been the symbiote’s decision. EVERYTHING,” it resonates. I equally love Flash’s response to himself, “He’s wrong. We’re different. We’re in control. We’re in control.” By referring to himself as “we” without realizing it, Flash shows that the symbiote has truly begun taking hold. Although he denies it, he has no control at all. This fight provided action and revealed character at the same time. On the other hand, Remender’s obnoxious characterization of Anti-Venom, with his televangelist schtick, makes a character I’ve never cared for especially grating.

RATING:

2.5 out of 5. Some great Flash Thompson character development salvages this issue, but Marvel forced it into a clumsy “Spider-Island” crossover.