It’s Death Spiral Part 2 of 9. Peter tries to repair his relationship with Aunt May but has to join up with Venom to fight Lady Octopus and Shocker. Peter learns that Mary Jane is Venom and they actually tell each other what’s going on in their lives. All of this, plus … a classic Lee/Romita villain dies???
(This cover is for those who read Spectacular Spider-Man #226 and thought “I want more of Peter hitting MJ”.)
CREDITS
Writer: Joe Kelly
Penciller: Ed McGuinness
Inkers: Mark Farmer & Cliff Rathburn
Colorist: Marcio Menyz
Letterer: VC’s Joe Caramagna
PREVIOUSLY IN AMAZING SPIDER-MAN …
Peter tried to pick up the pieces of his life now that he was back on Earth – visited his friend/co-worker Brian at the hospital, went through his voicemails, and checked up on Raelith the Wretched, Glitch and Symbie (at the Fantastic Four headquarters). He learned from Eddie Brock that Carnage knows his secret identity. Meanwhile Eddie Brock/Carnage is looking for a serial killer named Torment but first visited his son Dylan, which did not go well. MJ and Flash have a heart to heart, and she learns from Paul that Eddie came to see Dylan. All the while a bunch of unrelated people are killed or die in “accidents”- all with last names similar to Parker, Reilly, Brock and Weylin- by a killer that the Carnage symbiote is in secret contact with, who gives him the name of Mary Jane Watson!
SUMMARY
Peter visits Aunt May and Ric trying to smooth things over with her. Her new boyfriend, Ric, does his best to get in the way.(1)
(Guess who’s already at dinner?)
Peter is worried about Aunt May’s safety now that Carnage knows his secret identity, but he’s distracted by Venom fighting Lady Octopus outside.
(Aunt May doesn’t hear this battle right behind her?)
Spider-Man joins the battle but then Shocker shows up, who helps Lady Octopus get away while Spider-Man learns that Venom is not Eddie Brock, it’s MJ!
(Oh, Peter is in trouble now!)
Meanwhile, at the Bronx Zoo, Eddie is investigating one of the deaths from the last issue when he realizes that his “control” of the Carnage symbiote may not be as strong as he thought.
(Eddie’s face says “I’ve made a huge mistake.”)
Herman Schultz (Shocker) is at his apartment when Torment shows up and cuts both his feet and his arm off (that’s what happens, right?) with his razor sharp lightning bolt/whip. He reveals that Herman’s cousin married someone named “Watson”, which makes him a target.
(Torment: “I have … disarmed you.”)
Peter and MJ talk about recent events – him being punched into outer space, and her ending up bonded to the Venom symbiote. He tells her – and the symbiote – that Eddie told him that Carnage knows his secret identity, and that all of his loved ones are in danger.
(The face that we have Peter, MJ and the Venom symbiote having a casual conversation like this is just wild.)
At the same time, the police are at Herman’s apartment, where they find his corpse with “CARNAGE RULED” (past tense) in blood on the wall around the Shocker’s mask.
(RIP Herman.)
TO BE CONTINUED!(2)
INITIAL RESPONSE
This is part 2 of this crossover, but this is my first chance to talk about this crossover. Well, at least this one makes sense, as we’re crossing over with Spider-Man characters – Venom and Carnage. They *are* related characters. It’s not like it’s Spider-Man, Moon Knight, and … Kid Omega.
We actually get some follow-up on Peter’s absence with Aunt May and MJ, which is good and was not expected by me. But so far the threat of Torment is still mostly off-panel – Peter doesn’t know anything about him yet. But it’s just part 2. We’ve got 7 more parts of this story. And with Shocker’s death it looks like things are ramping up.
WHAT I LIKED
Peter sits down and talks with Aunt May. He really should tell her that he’s Spider-Man, but since Marvel seems determined to never let that happen (again), it was nice to see them actually talking, with him trying to explain that he’s been away even though, from her perspective, he was still around, just avoiding her.
(It really feels like May knows, but she wants Peter to be the one to tell her.)
I liked the 4-way fight with Spidey, Venom, Lady Octopus and Shocker. Shocker actually comes across as a threat, and actually saves Lady Octopus.
(Shocker’s “powers” would actually be effective against symbiotes.)
Peter learns that MJ is Venom. We got this a few issues ago but then – surprise! – we realized it was Ben pretending to be Peter. So it was good for him to learn the truth, and the two of them sit down and actually talk about what’s been going on in their lives.
(I do love that the symbiote goes out of its way to tell Peter that MJ and Paul broke up. Symbiote as wingman?)
I don’t know how we got to a point where the Venom symbiote is making jokes and inappropriate comments to break the tension, but … I kind of like it? The Venom movies at work, I guess.
(The new Spider-Throuple?)
While Shocker was never a favorite villain or character (bring back Superior Foes!) of mine, but his death did … (wait for it) … shock me. Yes, the letters page confirms that he is indeed, dead.
(“This classic Spider-Man villain will be honored … in an issue of Venom.”)
WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE
Enough with Aunt May getting a new man in her life and dropping hints about her getting some action. No one wants to hear this. Aunt May would not be saying this to Peter. It’s just wrong.
(Seriously, what woman talks like this to their family members?)
I should be on Ric’s side – he’s right about a lot of things about Peter based on the information he has. But he’s written to be so unlikable – it almost makes me miss Nathan Lubensky.
Peter’s reaction to learning that MJ is Venom almost seemed … childish? Taking off his mask and hyperventilating into it? This feels like something I’d see on a sitcom.
(Peter: “Whoops. Did I do that?”)
I really dislike the trope of heroes taking off their masks in public to talk to people, even if they’re on top of a building. We can literally see buildings nearby – someone could look out and take a picture of Spider-Man without his mask on. Please stop doing this.
(“Hey, I see Spider-Man sitting on a crane. Let me zoom in with my camera … he’s unmasked! Picture taken and … posted online.”)
The big threat of this story – at least from Peter’s perspective – is that Carnage knows his secret identity. Is this really that big of a deal? When is the last time Carnage was a threat to Spider-Man? Was it ASM #800? And then it was Norman controlling the Carnage symbiote to become the Red Goblin. Does Peter know that “Carnage” is no longer “the symbiote on Cletus Kassady”? It’s not like Carnage has been an arch-enemy of Spider-Man recently. It’s not good that that Carnage knows, but Peter is making it sound like it’s someone he fights regularly who just learned his secret. When is the last time Carnage went after Spidey? Tell me why I’m wrong in the comments.
Maybe I’m nitpicking but this one really annoyed me. Kelly tries to gaslight us with the very first narration of the issue, saying that while Peter was in space he thought about home all the time. But that’s not true. All the time he was in outer space, Peter *never* thought about home. Not in his dialogue to other characters, not in his internal monologue. He never thought about Aunt May, MJ, his friends, his job, his life at home. Nothing. I mentioned this more than once in my previous reviews – when he was in space he never thought about his life on Earth, his family, his friends, his job.
(I see what you’re doing, Kelly. Stop it.)
Absolutely nothing about Hellgate. Didn’t we spend a bunch of issues in outer space learning that he is a big threat for Spidey, and that Spidey has to save his planet from a catastrophe? Guess it wasn’t that important. Not that I want the Hellgate story to come back, but I just find it funny that it was such a big deal and now Peter (and the book) doesn’t care about it.
Same with Raelith the Wretched, Glitch and Symbie. The fact that they were all we had for so many issues, and we know they’re on Earth now, but for them not to be mentioned at all shows how inconsequential they really were.
(Part of this issue about Hellgate or any of the outer space characters.)
Pour one out for the Shocker. Before Superior Foes I wouldn’t have cared if he got killed. But for me he’ll always be the guy who took care of Silvermane’s head.
(Run, Shocker, run!)
WHAT THIS ISSUE MEANT OVERALL
Peter is working to fix his personal life, which is good. I fully expected him to return to Earth and we’d be told that he fixed everything between issues. I like that the book is taking the time to have Peter talk to Aunt May and MJ (although I guess his job, Shay, Randy, etc aren’t that important?). As for the overarching plot, the threat of Carnage knowing does not seem like that big of a deal to me (again, tell me why I’m wrong), and Torment does not interest me, but the crossover has my attention … for now.
GRADE
B-
This was a good issue. I have no interest in Torment – I get the feeling that he’ll be more of a Venom/Carnage villain than a Spider-Man villain. Still, the story has my interest so far. Like I said, if you have to do a crossover, do it with Spider-Man related characters where the crossover makes sense.
NEXT TIME, IN AN ALL-NEW ISSUE OF AMAZING SPIDER-MAN VENOM…
(I’ll be relying on the ASM recap page to tell me what happened in Venom)
FOOTNOTES
(1) Aunt May talks about Peter’s “Aunt Brenda” dying. I do not remember her ever being mentioned before, and the Marvel Wiki does not list her in Peter’s relatives. Could she be one of the people Torment killed with a Parker/Brock/Reilly/Weylin name? I went back and reread part 1 but didn’t see a Brenda in the victims.
(2) But not in this book. To be continued in Venom #255.
@Aqu@:
Thanks for that info-dump about Carnage and Eddie. I knew that Eddie had been forced to join with the Carnage symbiote, likely to save his own life, but that was the extent of my knowledge.
I assumed that the symbiote had been put in a similar predicament because it doesn’t seem happy to be with Eddie. Can it leave Eddie? Or is it stuck with him (potentially) permanently?
Someone shine the Symbiobro signal in the sky!
Yeah, the premise of the Carnage book was that neither Eddie nor Carnage can live without the other. After the end of Venom War, Eddie was mortally wounded and found himself in the famous church where all began, there he found Carnage dying from… something (I think it was some kind of lethal chemical developed by… Meridius?) and the two were forced to bond to survive.
Something like that, I don’t remember every detail, I only read the first issue of Carnage long ago and Venom War was kinda lackluster.
@Evan Berry:
“Carnage says to Eddie in this issue something like, ‘We need each other to live. I can’t get far without you’ or something like that, stating in no uncertain terms that he’ll die without a host.”
Haven’t we had multiple issues in the past where the Carnage symbiote was not bonded to Eddie and just wandering around? If so, then it can survive on its own. Has something changed to make it so that it will die without a host?
“We also had Eddie verbalize that he knows that Carnage’s motive is find a host who’s ‘better’ than Eddie”
According to the Carnage series recaps (on the patreon episodes) hasn’t Eddie said and known this all along? Even saying this to the symbiote? Both of them know that the symbiote would love to bond with someone else who would be more open to killing people, but it’s stuck with Eddie?
“I’m not exactly clear on how, but Eddie also states that he knows that Carnage has been feeding information to Torment the whole time.” I think Eddie is just deducing that Torment knows things that he shouldn’t be able to know, and the only way he could know those things would be if the symbiote was telling him. Not that big of a leap in logic.
Evan, that addiction monster could raise its head at her any day and we can only sit back and hope and pray that she stays on the straight and narrow. Maybe this new boyfriend of hers will help her to stay clean.
Your kids are gonna to love it.
@Dark Mark the Prognosticator — What are the Crawlspace Odds for Aunt May’s crack cocaine? Certainly they’re higher than Golden Oldie showing up, though she has to get her power from somewhere.
Well, it’s an oldie…where I come from.
@Hornacek — Stuff I learned from Venom #255 that might fill in the blanks a little for you: Carnage says to Eddie in this issue something like, “We need each other to live. I can’t get far without you” or something like that, stating in no uncertain terms that he’ll die without a host. He may be lying, though, as he’s shown he can act without Eddie’s sanction (which he illustrates by killing a lot of butterflies simultaneously, which shocks Eddie). We also had Eddie verbalize that he knows that Carnage’s motive is find a host who’s “better” than Eddie — i.e., an actual killer — so Eddie isn’t blindly getting close to Torment without that motive in his mind.
I’m not exactly clear on how, but Eddie also states that he knows that Carnage has been feeding information to Torment the whole time.
@Dark Mark, the Prognosticator:
“Seven more issues????? Geez. I hate this decompressed story telling. Pack in a story for my $5.” Hey, it could have been worse. Maximum Carnage was 14 (?) issues. And two of them were giant-sized Unlimited issues.
“my understanding was that this torment kills people around his target getting closer and closer until he gets them. Maybe I’m reading too much into the name of this arc – Death Spiral.” No, that matches up with my theory. I wouldn’t be surprised if Spidey eventually looks at the camera/reader and says “It’s like he’s doing a … death spiral.”
“With Peter being particularly worried about her, I figured that was foreshadowing. But I guess he may get no closer than MJ, since she is Venom now.” Does the Carnage symbiote know that Venom is MJ now? I have no idea.
“he bonds with Carnage which causes problems because he is methodical while Carnage is chaotic – Crawlspace odds 64%” I would guess the Carnage symbiote’s goal is to make Eddie get close enough to Torment and then leave Eddie and bond with Torment. Is the symbiote trapped on Eddie? Can it leave? I have no idea, I did not read the Carnage book.
“Aunt May turns back into Golden Oldie, teams up with Rek-Rap and saves everyone – Crawlspace odds 5%” Only if Ed McGuinness draws/writes the final issue of DS.
@Evan Berry:
As Nick Lowe promised in this letters page, we did get a tribute to Shocker, a classic Spidey villain … in an issue of Venom. (cough)
Seven more issues????? Geez. I hate this decompressed story telling. Pack in a story for my $5.
I will be the first to admit that I am not on the cutting edge of this story. I have not followed it anywhere but here. That said, my understanding was that this torment kills people around his target getting closer and closer until he gets them. Maybe I’m reading too much into the name of this arc – Death Spiral. I don’t guess Torment knows that is the name of this story, but he does have a spiral on his face, so there’s that. That’s why I think he will eventually start coming after people closer to Peter, like Aunt May. With Peter being particularly worried about her, I figured that was foreshadowing. But I guess he may get no closer than MJ, since she is Venom now.
I’m sticking with my theory. This thing will drag on until one of three things happen:
– he gets too close to Peter (I’m holding to Aunt May) – Crawlspace odds 45%
– he bonds with Carnage which causes problems because he is methodical while Carnage is chaotic – Crawlspace odds 64%
– Aunt May turns back into Golden Oldie, teams up with Rek-Rap and saves everyone – Crawlspace odds 5%
@Hornacek — Oh, yeah — I guess it’s quite literally a “death spiral.” Torment was so inspired that he decided to put this all over his body.
Like you always say, though, you shouldn’t have to read stories outside of the main title to get crucial information, so, hopefully, there’s more to this, especially with seven issues still to go!
@Evan Berry:
That motive makes sense, but it’s just Eddie’s guess. It could be the actual motive, but I wouldn’t be surprised if we get a different motive.
“Starts with the most distant relative and works in!” Like, a … spiral pattern?
@Hornacek — Regarding Torment’s motive, this will probably be in the recap for the next issue, but in Venom #255, Eddie says to the Carnage symbiote in a moment of epiphany, “He picks his victim and then he kills his way to them! Starts with the most distant relative and works in!”
So there’s that. Not sure if that’s just what they’re going with or if it will get some elaboration later on.
@Evan Berry:
“a lot of the stuff with Mary Jane operating Venom like a mech suit she can walk into and out of probably doesn’t make a lot of sense to me.” This seems very inspired by the MCU and Tony literally stepping into and out of his Iron Man armor.
“I guess, in that case, it doesn’t take much for a symbiote to bond with any host it wants.” There is precedent for the symbiote bonding with random people. When it escaped the FF holding cell it bonded with multiple people on its way back to Peter’s apartment.
“I also seem to recall an issues years ago in which a symbiote bonded with a rat and traversed the city that way. Now, apparently, symbiotes can be bipedal and talk and be humanoid in form without a host at all, so I wonder why one is even needed.” We did have a Venom-fish in The Last Dance movie.
@Dark Mark:
“Yeah, this is about a Peter & Eddie things because Torment is acting on Carnage’s information. That’s why it is so important that Carnage knows who Peter is.” I guess but Carnage/Torment doesn’t seem to be targeting Peter or people he cares about. It’s literal strangers whose only connection is that their last name are the same/similar to Peter and Eddie. It’s like being told “a bunch of people with no connection to you died in the next city over”. It’s sad, but it doesn’t really have anything to do with you.
For right now, Torment just seems to be killing random people. There doesn’t seem to be any goal or plan here besides killing people with names related to Peter or Eddie. I also don’t read Venom or Carnage so I don’t know what the Carnage symbiote’s plans are. It would make sense that it would want to be on someone who wants to kill people, so why not want to get onto Torment? Is the Carnage symbiote being on Eddie really a long-term thing?
“I don’t know if they want to go this dark or not, but what if the Carnage/Torment symbiote goes after Aunt May forcing Peter to kill Torment in front of Aunt May?” Right now Torment seems to be only going after unrelated people with similar names. Is the goal to eventually go after Peter and his actual friends/family? Maybe, but there’s no proof of that.
@Evan Berry:
“In my mind, I guess I was thinking of the Terminator going after anyone named Sarah Connor.” But that was an actual goal – eliminate John Connor by killing all possible mothers of him. But here Torment is just killing random people whose names are similar to Peter and Eddie and their families. Most of them are not related to Peter and Eddie at all. So to Peter and Eddie, Torment is killing strangers, not family members or people they know. They would care about the murders, but those murders don’t *mean* anything to them.
“It still bothers me that Peter hung up on the voicemail in which he learns that a distant relative died.” To be fair, it was a relative that had never been mentioned before, and one that Peter had probably never met. I’ve been told “your X passed away” and I had no idea who that person was. What am I (or Peter) supposed to do with that information? I don’t know who that person is. It’s sad, but (to quote the Mariah Carey meme), I don’t know them. Am I supposed to be that sad about the death of someone I’ve never heard of before? What am I supposed to do with that information?
@Mark — I’m not up on symbiote lore, either, which is why a lot of the stuff with Mary Jane operating Venom like a mech suit she can walk into and out of probably doesn’t make a lot of sense to me. My guess is that if Aunt May witnesses Peter with the symbiotes, it’ll probably just be a matter of time before Marvel gives her one, too. I could see Venom covering her with he himself calls “goo” and saving her from a killing blow from Carnage or Torment. I think something like that was what gave Mary Jane the symbiote (though I’m not sure), but I don’t know if that alone is enough to stop Kelly, Soule, or Ewing from having something similar happen again. (It’s like poetry — It rhymes.)
I happened to have read the previous issue of Venom, and (pardon this spoiler if anyone hasn’t read it), it appears from the art that Venom disengaged Madame Masque from her mech suit by seeping into it and bonding with her and simply ejecting “herself.” I guess, in that case, it doesn’t take much for a symbiote to bond with any host it wants. I could have misinterpreted the art somehow, though. It’s what it looked like to me. I also seem to recall an issues years ago in which a symbiote bonded with a rat and traversed the city that way. Now, apparently, symbiotes can be bipedal and talk and be humanoid in form without a host at all, so I wonder why one is even needed.
Yeah, this is about a Peter & Eddie things because Torment is acting on Carnage’s information. That’s why it is so important that Carnage knows who Peter is. I think it is pretty clear that despite what Eddie thinks, he is not in control of Carnage. Carnage keeps trying to get him to go after Torment supposedly to kill him, but my money is on the fact that Carnage wishes to jump hosts and take Torment as his new guy. Should that happen, though, I think Torment might be our “hero” as he wants there to be a reason behind each kill and Carnage just wants the kill.
That’s said, I’m not up on symbiote lore and I don’t know what it takes to change hosts.
I don’t know if they want to go this dark or not, but what if the Carnage/Torment symbiote goes after Aunt May forcing Peter to kill Torment in front of Aunt May?
@Hornacek – In my mind, I guess I was thinking of the Terminator going after anyone named Sarah Connor.
It still bothers me that Peter hung up on the voicemail in which he learns that a distant relative died. It seems kind of callous, even if it’s a relative he has never met or heard of. If that was supposed to play for humor, it failed.
@Evan Berry:
I didn’t catch onto the last names of the victims until about halfway through that issue so once I knew that I was looking at the names, and when I saw Weylin I thought “wait a minute”. But then I remembered Eddie’s ex-wife was similarly named (had to look it up).
“I wonder what kind of explanation will be given for why a character would want to kill anyone who’s had a symbiote.” I didn’t take it as killing anyone who had a symbiote – I think Torment is killing random people whose name matches Peter and Eddie and their family. At first I saw “Reilly” and thought “Oh, that’s for Ben Reilly” but it likely makes more sense if this is because May’s last name is Reilly. Would Torment know who Ben Reilly was? No, but he would know Peter’s only family is May (Reilly) Parker.
“It seems to me that if he’s killing Shocker because a relative married a Watson, he might as well just take everybody out to tie up any loose ends.” With Torment learning last issue that “Watson” would be added to his list of target names, this makes it more likely that his targets are not people with symbiote history, just connections to Peter and Eddie, even if it’s just the same last name.
@Hornacek — Thanks, Craig! I completely forgot about Eddie’s wife. I guess I can’t feel too bad for that. I do feel bad for somehow not catching that name in the book itself. I wonder what kind of explanation will be given for why a character would want to kill anyone who’s had a symbiote. It seems to me that if he’s killing Shocker because a relative married a Watson, he might as well just take everybody out to tie up any loose ends. Anyway, what about Mac Gargan and Norman and Normie Osborn? Norman just had the Hobgoblin go after his family, and now this.
@DarkMark:
I would be more upset about Shocker’s death if we hadn’t already gone through Boomerang’s meaningful death and then him being brought back to life during … Dark Web? Either Shocker will be brought back to life or Marvel will reveal that Herman has a daughter/niece who will take up the role and be a new Shocker.
Part of me does like the randomness – the only reason Torment targeted Shocker is because he has a relative named “Watson”, and he just found out last issue that “Watson” should be added to his list of names of people to kill. But still, Herman had nothing to do with this, he was just a random victim, which does suck.
The story is well done, but just not for me. I am glad that Peter and MJ are talking and I do like the meta joke that Venom makes when he says that many people did not like Paul. I did like Shocker, mainly because a childhood friend of mine LOVED Shocker. I liked his transition from tough guy to loser and now he got his vibe back just to be killed off. Oh well. I won’t any sleep over it, but he will be missed. A little. Anyway, it will all be worth it if Silvermane’s head on an RC car rides into the story to get revenge.
Anne Weying is the name of Eddie’s (deceased) ex-wife.
“Anaconda consumes local resident Francine Weylin, 72”. It’s on the page where Eddie is talking to the Carnage symbiote.
@Hornacek — I have a question: I may be missing something, because when I saw that you had written the name Weylin with Parker, Reilly, and Brock, I thought that was a mistake and you meant “Watson.” Then I saw that have the name Weylin in the endnotes as well, so it’s not likely that that was a mistake. So my question is who is Weylin? I don’t recall seeing that name in the issue at all and I don’t know of any characters with that name who had a symbiote.
I’m now questioning my ability to comprehend what I read.