Venomverse is a 2017 Bat Family Crossover for Marvel Comics' Venom, written by Cullen Bunn; and is the first of a three-part series. It parallels 2014/2015's Spider-Verse in that Earth-616's Eddie Brock must team up with alternate universe incarnations of Venom to save the multiverse, but is more rooted in science fiction and horror. Rather than the Inheritors, the symbiote squad is up against the Poisons, a group of creatures seeking to attain unlimited power and conquer the Multiverse by assimilating and dominating symbiotes. A crossover sequel with X-Men: Blue titled "Poison X" began in January 2018, while a second, Marvel-Universe wide sequel called Venomized was released in April 2018.
In January 2023, it was announced that the finale of the Venomverse saga — Death of the Venomverse — would kickstart the "Summer of Symbiotes" and have Carnage as the Big Bad.
- Edge of Venomverse #1 — 5
- Venomverse #1 — 5
- Venomverse: War Stories
- Monsters Unleashed #6 — 8
Contains examples of:
- Anti-Hero Team: The various Venoms run the gamut from heroes to antiheroes to outright villains; but all of them share a proclivity for violence that most incarnations of Spider-Man lack. The main squad is comprised of Earth-616 Venom, Mania, Agent Venom, and Venomized versions of Ant-Man, Black Panther, Captain America, Doctor Strange, Ghost Rider, Old Man Logan, Rocket Raccoon, Spider-Man, Spinneret, and X-23.
- Alternate Continuity:
- Edge of Venomverse #1 offers a loose alternate take on NYX, and as such features Kiden, Bobby, Tatiana, Lil' Bro, and Zebra Daddy. However it takes place much earlier in Laura's history, (two months after Laura's escape from the Facility as opposed to two years) and Laura is not a prostitute under Daddy's control. Additionally, instead of the plot centering around Daddy trying to get Laura back after Kiden helps her run away, Daddy is pursuing Kiden and her gang because they owe him money. In this universe Laura has no connection to him at all.
- Differences in the Host Rider Universe shown in Edge of Venomverse #3 include Spider-Man dying in the 1980s and Deadpool somehow becoming a Sasquatch with Doctor Octopus's tentacles.
- Edge of Venomverse #4 is set 15 years after the end of an alternate version of Old Man Logan, where the Venomized T. rex survived its encounter with Black Bolt.
- Cullen Bunn mentioned that the Venomized Spider-Man hails from an version Earth-616 where Eddie Brock never moved beyond being a revenge-obsessed outright villain, causing their enmity to intensify until something happened to cause Peter to reclaim the symbiote.
- Carnage was brought in from a world where he succeeded in killing Eddie Brock.
- Ascended Extra:
- The promotional banner and one of the special-edition covers features Poison from What If? Spider-Man: The Other, where the Venom symbiote permanently bonded to Peter Parker's body after he refused the Other's offer of resurrection following his death at Morlun's hands. It's not known if he is connected to the Poisons who are serving as the series' antagonists, or simply has the same name as them.
- The Earth-616 incarnation of Rocket Raccoon briefly played host to the Venom symbiote in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 #22, alongside Groot and Drax; but a version of him stars as one of the members of the squad.
- The Assimilator: One detail revealed about the Poisons is that when they find a symbiote, they form an unstoppable, one-sided bond to it to become more powerful.
- Batman Cold Open: Venom, presumably still sore over the Savage Six thing, is in the middle of trouncing Jack O'Lantern when he's teleported off-world by Doctor Strange and the Resistance.
- Big Bad: The Poisoned are lead by a Poisoned version of Doctor Doom. In turn, Doom answers to a Poisoned Thanos, who himself answers to the Poison Queen.
- Bowdlerize: Ashley Barton isn't referred to as "Spider-Bitch" in Edge #4, though in this case it's due to characters being interrupted before they can actually say it rather than the story ignoring the name and giving her a new one like Spider-Verse did.
- The Bus Came Back:
- After having been deliberately excluded from Spider-Verse, the Venomverse promotional banner showcases numerous incarnations of Venom only seen in one-shots or whose last appearances were years ago — including Earth-X Venom, Venompool, both versions of Ultimate Venom, Venom Punisher, and Poison.
- Kiden and her gang haven't been seen in the main Marvel 'verse since NYX: No Way Home in 2008.
- Conservation of Ninjutsu: Venpool, being an alternate version of Gwenpool, references this trope in Edge of Venomverse 2, while butchering through a bunch of Hand ninjas. She says that she'd be a lot of trouble if it were a single ninja, but since they came in larger numbers they are just fodder to show off how powerful she is. She even calls it the "Inverse Ninja Law" and tells them to look it up.
- The Corrupter: When Eddie is offered to join the resistance against the Poisons, a Venomized Spider-Man as well as the Venomized Mary Jane from Renew Your Vows object that Eddie is a psychopath that has a corrupting influence on his symbiote. Eddie rebuffs them by saying that while they know a version of him who's like that, they don't know him.
- Covers Always Lie:
- The promotional banner and some of the covers showcase a number of prominent Venoms both from Earth-616 and the various alternate universes, including all the mainstream hosts, Venom 2099, Earth-X Venom, Mangaverse Venom, Ultimate Venom, and Poison. The only Venoms from this spread to appear in the event itself were Eddie Brock, Mania, Agent Venom, Old Man Logan, X-23, and Spinneret.
- The covers of the fourth and fifth issues show Captain Venom fighting alongside the other Venoms, whereas during the event itself he is consumed by a Poison during the second issue.
- Dirty Coward: Bruce Banner Jr. Despite possessing his father's strength, he doesn't face the Venom-powered Old Man Logan, instead throwing Archangel at him.
- Evil Learns of Outside Context: Twofold, as the Poisons were unaware of the existence of the Multiverse until Doctor Strange started bringing in Venoms from other universes to oppose them, and were unaware of symbiotes other than Venom until he summoned Carnage. This led to them attempting to conquer the Multiverse in Venomized and ransacking Klyntar in order to do so.
- Evil vs. Evil: Downplayed a bit, but the Poisons seem to be a more cruel version of what a Venom host can be and even taking into account Venom's heroic deeds at times they still tried to kill their respective Spiders in the past. Played Straight regarding Carnage, who Eddie has Doctor Strange summon to help the Venoms fight the Poisons.
- Godzilla Threshold: When Mania mentions that the Venoms need "some sort of doomsday weapon" just to have any hope at all of standing against the Poisons, Eddie convinces Strange to conjure one up in the form of Carnage.Doctor Strange: I'm reaching through time and space. But it is like water slipping through my fingers. N-no... not water. Blood.
Black Panther: This is wrong. We must stop this... undo the summoning.
Venom: Belay that, Strange. We're out of options. Venoms are being picked off as fast as you can 'port them in. You wanted a nuke, Panther. This is it. - Heroic Sacrifice: The symbiote-Deadpool deliberately lets himself be consumed by the Poisons in the hope that his insanity will let him hold onto enough of his personality so that he can provide the other heroes with inside information before being consumed by the Poison hive.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Ashley Barton, Warren Worthington and Bruce Banner Jr. attempt to kill Old Man Logan by sending the Venom-bonded Tyrannosaurus rex to kill him. This backfires spectacularly:
- First, Ashley attempts to weaken Logan by webbing up his hands. Logan uses the web strand to throw into the dino's waiting mouth.
- After Logan is swallowed by the T. rex, the Venom symbiote bonds with him, allowing to break free and easily overwhelm Bruce and Warren.
- Hopeless War: War Stories #1 reveals the Poisons are picking off the Venoms faster than Doctor Strange can summon them, even taking out the likes of the Hulk and the Rhino.
- Luring in Prey: The Poisons are a race of parasites who target beings who are bonded to Klyntar, latching onto and taking them over. They can create illusions of their intended victim's loved ones in order to draw them in closer.
- Moral Myopia: Warren Worthinton. He hates Old Man Logan for killing the X-Men, refusing to believe it was a mistake, yet he teams up with Ashley Barton and Bruce Banner Jr. (who plan to use Logan's DNA to create a clone army to take over the world) to take his revenge on him.
- No One Gets Left Behind: Venom tries to save the Venomized Spider-Man (key word being tried) from a Poisoned Doc Ock, even after Spidey's insistence that he should save himself and despite them constantly bickering beforehand.
- No-Sell: Due to being the master of the mystic arts, Doctor Strange can resist and even see through the Poisons' illusions.
- Innocently Insensitive: At least one reviewer has criticized the segment of Edge of Venomverse featuring Ngozi for being ableist and extremely insensitive, though the author has stated that was not her intent.
- Original Generation:
- Characters who debuted as Venomized alternate covers — including X-23, Ghost Rider, and Gwenpool — are featured as protagonists of the Edge of Venomverse event, similarly to how the Edge of Spider-Verse preceded the Spider-Verse.
- One of the new Venoms introduced in War Stories is a teenaged Nigerian girl named Ngozi, who used to be an athlete before a bus crash robbed the use of her legs. By the end of her segment, she and the symbiote take over for the late T'Challa as the Black Panther and becomes the interim Queen of Wakanda. She later starred in the sixth issue of Black Panther: Long Live The King.
- Shout-Out: Edge of Venomverse #5's opening narration pokes fun at Batman's origin story; and contains numerous references to the Alien franchise: a spiny worm-like creature with a fanged maw erupts from an apple in a clear reference to a Chest Burster, the parasitology lab he breaks into is called "Ripley Diagnostics", and the head researcher's name is "Dr. Scott". St. MacReady's General Hospital is a reference to the main character of The Thing (1982).
- The Symbiote: The event focuses on a group of Venom incarnations fighting a war against crystalline creatures called Poisons, which permanently bond to the symbiotes and consume their host. As the situation grows more desperate, Carnage is brought in to be used as a weapon against the Poisons.
- Toilet Humour: Edge of Venomverse #5 features Venompool going up against mutant tapeworms, and is rife with dirty jokes and literal toilet humor.
- Token Evil Teammate: Host Rider is the only outright villainous member of the Venoms, being a Serial-Killer Killer who doesn't care about the innocents caught in the crossfire. But even he doesn't hold a candle to Carnage, who Eddie has Doctor Strange summon to aid in the fight against the Poisons.
- Vanilla Protagonist: Gwenpool accuses Eddie Brock of being one in issue 4. As she points out, compared to the likes of Hulk Venom, Wolverine Venom, and Rocket Raccoon Venom, plain old original Venom seems like the boring friend who only gets invited to a party out of pity.
- We Hardly Knew Ye:
- In the second Edge of Venomverse issue, Venpool is Killed Offscreen by a Poison impersonating Daredevil. She later returns as a Poison, but is killed off by Deadpool before the end of the issue.
- Venomized Spider-Man is consumed by a Poison at the end of the first issue, despite Venom's best efforts to save him.
- Wild Card: Carnage, who makes it clear several times that his alliance with the Venoms is only temporary and that once the Poisons are dead he'll turn on them.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: It's never shown what happened to the Venomized Punisher from War Stories, with the implication being that he was either killed or consumed.
