Summary

  • Venom has evolved from a simple Spider-Man villain to his own character with multiple variants across the Marvel Multiverse.
  • Peter Parker, Eddie Brock, Flash Thompson, and Hulk are among the most powerful and iconic hosts of the Venom symbiote.
  • Venom’s potential extends to merging with an entire planet in the ultimate form known as Venom World, showcasing its terrifying evolution.



Marvel has many iconic characters, and Venom is by far one of the most popular. Having appeared in dozens of comics, video games, and a film trilogy, what began as a simple Spider-Man villain has exploded in popularity. Which is why it’s no surprise Marvel has explored dozens of variants of the symbiote antihero.

Marvel’s Multiverse has allowed for dozens of different versions of the same character, putting new spins on some of its biggest stars (Spider-Man and Wolverine chief among them). Because of the Venom symbiote’s ability to bond with pretty much anyone, the alien can be put into any situation, and always provide the opportunity for a compelling, new creation. Across the multiverse, these are the most powerful versions of Venom ever created.


10 ‘Black Suit Spider-Man’ Was The First To Use The Venom Symbiote

Multiversal Designation: Earth-616


First Appearance

Creators

Origin

Amazing Spider-Man #252

Randy Schueller, Jim Shooter, and Mike Zeck

Peter Parker was the first “Venom” and encountered the symbiote as part of Marvel’s Secret Wars event.

The first host of the Venom Symbiote was Peter Parker. After being involved in a major event called Secret Wars, Peter got a brand new black suit. At first, he simply assumed this to be an advanced suit that had futuristic features. Eventually, Peter realized his black suit wasn’t just an advanced suit, but an actual alien symbiote. This was a major moment in Peter’s history, and it set the stage for everything that came after.

Peter would eventually push the symbiote away, rejecting it. This led to the symbiote wanting revenge on him, which resulted in it bonding with Eddie Brock, creating Venom, one of Spider-Man’s most dangerous villains. While Peter used the symbiote, he didn’t gain any of the abilities that Venom is known for now. But he was still plenty powerful thanks to the symbiote enhancing his classic powers, such as super strength and webbing.


9 Dylan Brock Is A Worthy Successor To His Father

Multiversal Designation: Earth-616

First Appearance

Creators

Origin

Venom (Vol. 4) #7

Donny Cates and Iban Coello

The son of Eddie Brock, half-symbiote physiology.

Eddie’s son, Dylan Brock. Dylan hasn’t been Venom for long, but he’s proven to be quite adept at the role. While he’s not nearly as experienced as his father, he’s perfectly capable of being Venom, and his powers from being half-symbiote physiology. These powers allow Dylan to affect symbiotes in a variety of ways, such as physically repelling them if they attempt to bond with him or forcing them to evolve and learn new abilities.


These powers vastly make up for Dylan’s lack of experience as Venom and the upcoming Venom War Event will decide once and for all whether Dylan or his father, Eddie, deserve the role. While Eddie has been Venom for a lot longer and has a greater mastery over the Venom symbiote, Dylan’s powers allo him to literally control and command any symbiote he wants, which makes Dylan far more dangerous than his father.

8 Eddie Brock Is Venom’s Most Famous Host

Multiversal Designation: Earth-616

First Appearance

Creators

Origin

Web of Spider-Man #18

David Michelinie and Todd McFarlane

A disgruntled former photographer who bonds with the rejected symbiote to seek revenge on Peter Parker.


By far the most famous Venom host of all time. Eddie Brock has been Venom for the majority of Venom’s history. Eddie Brock started out as a villain to Spider-Man, evolved into an anti-hero, and eventually became a full-blown hero. Eddie is one of the greatest hosts the symbiote has ever had and nearly all hosts later were compared to him. While bonded to the symbiote, Eddie has incredible strength, agility, and has access to all of Peter’s powers, except for spider-sense.

With the upcoming Venom War, it’s possible that Eddie’s time as Venom will finally come to an end and the mantle will be permanently be passed onto his son. It’s hard to imagine a time when Eddie won’t be Venom due to how long he’s spent in the mantle. Eddie has since moved on to the role of the King in Black, which has made him far more powerful than he ever was as Venom.

7 Agent Venom Was Venom’s Greatest Host

Multiverse Designation: Earth-616


First Appearance

Creators

Origin

Amazing Fantasy #15

Stan Lee and Steve Ditko

Flash Thompson gained the Venom symbiote after losing his legs from his tour in Iraq.

While Eddie Brock is the most famous host of all time, he isn’t the best one. That title seems to go to Flash Thompson. There has never been a host more perfectly suited to the Venom symbiote than Flash, and even Eddie notes this. While visiting Flash’s grave, the Venom symbiote still pulls towards it, trying to leave Eddie for the corpse. While bonded to Flash, they were known as Agent Venom and Flash was able to help save the world several times.

He even became a member of the Avengers and helped to fight Carnage on several occasions. The unique thing about Agent Venom, is while Eddie tended to result on pure brute strength as Venom, Agent Venom used weaponry, mostly guns and other gadgets, which he used the Venom symbiote to enhance. This gave him far more versatility in combat, and Eddie seems to think that it proved he had a greater mastery over the symbiote.


Related

Agent Venom Cosplay Proves His Coolest Redesign Will Never Die

No matter how much Venom’s path changes going forward, Flash Thompson’s Agent Venom will always be one of the symbiote’s most incredible iterations.

6 Wolverine Was One Of The Most Deadly Symbiote Hosts

Multiversal Designation: Earth-1984

Wolverine bonded with the Venom symbiote, popping his claws with Venom's characteristic toothy smile & long tongue.

First Appearance

Creators

Origin

What if…? Venom #2

Jeremy Holt and Jesus Hervas

Wolverine is bonded to the Venom symbiote.

Venom has been bonded to a few different symbiotes over the years, but he’s never really been bonded to the Venom symbiote on the main 616 Earth. The same can’t be said for Earth-1984. It was here that Sabretooth managed to trick Wolverine into bonding with the Venom symbiote. What happened next was an absolute nightmare scenario, as the Venom symbiote quickly sealed Wolverine’s mind away, taking full control of his body.


With Venom in full control, it went on a rampage across New York and slaughtered several people, including two cops. Unfortunately, it took Wolverine quite a bit to regain control, but when he did, he promised he would break the Venom symbiote and make it work for him. This version of Venom didn’t last for long, but it had incredible powers, with the symbiote even calling Wolverine’s body “indestructible.”

5 Poison Was A Peter Fully In Control Of Peter Parker

Multiversal Designation: Earth-70134

First Appearance

Creators

Origin

What If? Spider-Man The Other

Peter David and Khoi Pham

A Spider-Man completely broken by the Venom symbiote.


One of the darkest forms of Peter Parker was in What If? Spider-Man The Other, after nearly being killed, Spider-Man enters a cocoon to heal and be reborn. On Earth-616 this resulted in Peter coming back stronger than ever, but on Earth-70134, he refused to be reborn, and so his body lay in the cocoon, in stasis. Sensing this, the Venom symbiote abandons Eddie Brock and goes after Spider-Man. While Spider-Man tries to resist and fight the symbiote off, he eventually succumbs.

Peter emerges from the cocoon as the monster known as Poison. Peter has been completely broken by the symbiote and the symbiote is in total control of his mind and body. This transforms Peter into a vicious villain who very nearly kills Mary Jane. This is one of the strongest versions of Peter to have worn the Venom symbiote. Not only does it have all of Peter’s powers, completely unrestrained from Peter’s morality, but it also has extra ones, like stingers.


4 The Venomsaurus Was Marvel’s Most Fearsome Beast

Multiversal Designation: Earth-66

Venom Dinosaur T Rex Marvel Comic

First Appearance

Creators

Origin

Edge of Spider-Verse (Vol. 3) #1

Karla Pacheco and Pere Perez

A version of Eddie Brock who is a dinosaur and got the Venom symbiote.

There are few things cooler than dinosaurs, but a dinosaur with the Venom symbiote is likely the coolest version of Venom shown so far. This version of Venom became a major threat to the other dinosaur heroes on Earth-66. Despite these villainous origins, the Venomsaurus would eventually give it’s life in the battle against Carnage during the Death of the Venomverse storyline. While this version of Venom may not be the strongest out there, it’s difficult to top the sheer violence and brutality of a T. Rex with a symbiote.


This Venom lacked the agility of other forms, but with its tendrils and the brutality of its T. Rex nature, it was able to put up a good fight against multiple foes at once. What this version of Venom lacks in power, it absolutely makes up for in pure cool factor.

3 Reed Richard’s Was One Of The Most Dangerous Venom Hosts

Multiversal Designation: Earth-21619

Reed Richard's Taken Over By Venom Symbiote

First Appearance

Creators

Origin

Spider-Man: Spider’s Shadow #1

Chip Zdarsky and Pasqual Ferry

Reed Richard’s is taken over by the symbiote.


During the events of Spider-Man: Spider’s Shadow, readers got to see what would have happened if Peter had never rejected the Venom symbiote. This culminates with Peter murdering half of his rogues gallery and nearly being killed by the Sinister Six, who form to stop him. After nearly being killed, Peter is able to free himself from the Venom symbiote, and in a rage, the symbiote bonds itself to Reed Richards. This grants the symbiote full access to Reed’s absurd intelligence, and it uses this to make several clones of itself, which it then infects most of the Fantastic Four and the Avengers with.

It’s nearly an apocalyptic situation, but thankfully, Spider-Man is able to kill the Venom symbiote and disable the cloned ones. Usually, when the Venom symbiote bonds with someone, the focus is on that person’s enhanced strength, but that wasn’t the case here. It wasn’t Reed’s powers that allowed the Venom symbiote to nearly end the world, but his incredible intelligence that the symbiote turned to evil.


Related

Did Spider-Man’s black symbiote suit turn him evil in the original comics?

Spider-Man didn’t know his new black suit was actually a living alien when he received it in the Secret Wars (1984) comic event, and got rid of it once he learned the truth. Then when the symbiote bonded with Eddie Brock over their hatred of Spider-Man, they became the villain Venom. So was their ‘hatred for Spider-Man’ the thing that bonded them and turned them evil, or was the symbiote just evil to start with? And if Peter Parker realized the symbiote was corrupting him, why would he let it bond with another victim instead?

2 Venom Hulk Was The Physically Strongest Version Of Venom

Multiversal Designation: Earth-616

First Appearance

Creators

Origin

Absolute Carnage #3

Donny Cates and Ryan Stegman

Hulk merges with the Venom Symbiote to fight Carnage.

The Hulk is well known for being one of the most physically powerful characters in Marvel, and this was increased even further when Hulk gained the Venom symbiote. As Carnage tears through the Avengers, the Venom symbiote abandons Eddie Brock and merges with the Hulk, hoping the extra physical strength will be enough to stop Carnage’s rampage. Unfortunately, Carnage manages to easily defeat Venom Hulk with little problems. Since then, readers haven’t really gotten to see the two team up again.


The merge of Hulk and Venom created one of the most dangerous versions of Venom that readers have ever seen. Hulk’s physical power is some of the highest that Marvel has to offer, and the Venom symbiote not only enhanced this, but also granted him more mobility and ranged options thanks to the Venom symbiotes tendrils.

1 Veno mWorld Is Venom’s Ultimate Final Form

Multiversal Designation: Possible Future Of Earth-616

Venom #29, Eddie Brock time travels far into the future and discovers Venom World

First Appearance

Creators

Origin

Venom #29

Al Ewing and Cafu

A version of Venom that eventually takes over the entire planet.


The ultimate version of the Venom symbiote is the one that merges with an entire planet. Readers haven’t gotten to see much of this Venom World, as it’s only been seen in a few flashes of the future. It’s likely that Venom eventually grows so powerful that he merges with the planet itself. Readers can see fully formed continents on the planet, implying there may even be life on it. Venom World would likely move through space, continuing to feed on planet after planet and adding them to its own mass.

It’s a terrifying look at the final full potential of the Venom symbiote. It has managed to bond with just about everyone it comes across, so the ultimate evolution of this is merging with an entire planet. While Venom versions of the Hulk and Wolverine are certainly strong and dangerous, they absolutely pale in comparison to an entire world that has become Venom.

venom

Venom

Venom is the name of an alien lifeform in the Marvel Comics canon that first premiered as a formless symbiote alien in “The Amazing Spider-Man” comic series. Initially a villain, Venom continued to bond with hosts such as Spider-Man and Eddie Brock, who affected his personality and eventually evolved into an antihero known as “The Lethal Protector.”




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