Friday, May 4, 2012

Venom #17

First up tonight is the latest issue of Venom. I've had a couple of my fellow comic fans tell me the last page of this issue is a shocker, so needless to say, I am thoroughly looking forward to getting there!

Venom #17:

Summary: We open with Flash lying to Dr. Pym in order to get the Venom symbiote delivered to him. You see, Flash wants to kill Crime-Master(and Jack O' Lantern) in order to save his family and friends from Crime-Master's threats. While Venom is swinging towards Crime-Master's headquarters though, he's being watched by Eddie Brock... Crime-Master invites the Human Fly into his office and offers him a spot on the team of villains Crime-Master was putting together. Outside, Venom has set up and was aiming a sniper rifle at Crime-Master when he is attacked by crazy Eddie. The fighting alerts Crime-Master to the assassination attempt, and Crime-Master sends his goons after Venom, nearly killing him before he manages to escape. However, Eddie didn't escape and ends up being captured by Crime-Master and his goons. This issue ends with Crime-Master opening a biohazard container holding a symbiote and bonding Eddie with a new symbiote(!).

Thoughts: Yup, that ending WAS awesome! The rest of this issue wasn't that bad, although non-powered Eddie Brock managing to follow Venom, with Venom never knowing, was a bit of a stretch for me... Same thing with Eddie stepping in JUST as Venom was about to assassinate Crime-Master. Yeah, I get that it's a work of fiction and all, but that's a lot of suspension of belief I'm being asked for! All in all, I thought this was ANOTHER good issue of this series, as usual.

Score: 7 1/2 out of 10.
venom #17
Okay, the dude with Tetris powers? Awesomeness squared.

11 comments:

  1. I believe that is suppose to be Toxin, leading to my question. What the hell happened to Toxin?

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  2. I figured it was Toxin too, but I swear that Blackheart had the Toxin symbiote during the Circle storyline, so I didn't want to say that it was Toxin in the review without some sort of affirmation... I have NO idea how Toxin wound up in Vegas to begin with though. That sounds like a story that needs to be told.

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  3. Yep that's Toxin and according to Wiki

    "The Toxin symbiote later appears in an underground lab in Las Vegas, having apparently been separated from Mulligan. Blackheart is secretly in charge of the operation to duplicate the Toxin symbiote and bond it to clones of X-23 as part of a soul-stealing plot. The Crime Master sends his underling Jack O' Lantern and blackmails his enemy Venom into retrieving the symbiote. A fight with security personnel results in Jack taking the symbiote and fleeing.

    Toxin is mentioned at the conclusion of the first issue of Carnage USA, along with Venom, Anti-Venom, Hybrid, and his sister Scorn, as being the next option to stop Carnage's rampage in the Mid-west after the Avengers are defeated. However, the US military is unable to find Toxin, leaving it up to the Hybrid symbiotes and Scorn to stop Carnage."

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  4. Yea, I think Blackheart had it in Vegas and that is who Venom stole it from for Crime Master. Blackheart was cloning it somehow.

    What bugs me is that Toxin was suppose to be the reject symbiote yet now he looks like the toughest one around.

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  5. So basically we have no idea how the Toxin symbiote ended up in a lab in Vegas then? Here's hoping that eventually gets explained...

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  6. I took a look back at "Venom" #13, because I remember having this question at the time. Blackheart referred to "all the people" he had to kill to get the symbiote. At the time, I was confused, because he was using the symbiote in that issue (#13) but Jack O'Lantern had already stolen it in issue #11. I wondered if Blackheart maybe had killed Crime-Master and Jack O'Lantern (hence "all the people" he had to kill) to get it back, but, since they're alive here, he was clearly talking about getting it in the first place (and presumably using a sample he had saved when we see it in issue #13). So, yes, I think Blackheart originally stole it from someone and then Jack O'Lantern stole it in issue #11.

    I totally agree on the perfect timing of Eddie interrupting the shot. It was the only flaw in this issue for me.

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  7. Great issue.

    @JW: I didn't think of it as Eddie having perfect timing. Instead, I think Eddie's sonic bullets caused Venom to pull the trigger accidentally. It was unclear as to whether Flash was ready to take the shot, he clearly had conflicted feelings about being a murderer.

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  8. Damn it all to hell. Dunno about Bunn yet, but boy does he have a hard act to follow:

    http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=38604

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  9. Aha! That makes much more sense!

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  10. Ah, thanks for clearing all of that up, JW. The way you put it actually does make sense. For me, once I put a comic away, I usually don't bother pulling it back out again for a few years. For example, I just re-read the entire Avengers: The Initiative run over again the past few days(which I hadn't read since it switched over to Avengers Academy) and the X-Man Shaman issues(which I hadn't read in years).

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  11. Thanks for the post I Love to read your blog post. IT was good to hear from you. But right now I am so excited about to watch Marvels next upcoming movie Venom 2018. I already Watch Venom 2018 online all the video trailers and now waiting for the movie.

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