Are y’all ready for Gwenom? Because I sure as heck am!
Seriously, though. I’m normally pretty averse to Venom-izing things, but Jason Latour and Robbie Rodriguez set this story up beautifully with the last arc. Now let’s see how it all starts to play out, shall we?
First Read Reactions
- This kid is one heck of a good street artist, but I’m not sure I agree with this opinion about good stories needing dead heroes.
- Nothing like Gwen and the Venom symbiote waxing philosophically about life while roughing up some enforcers.
- Now THAT is how you use sound waves to your advantage.
- Hey look, Earth-65 Mary Jane Watson is actually showing some empathy.
- Hey look, Earth-65 Aleksei Sytsevich/The Rhino is a much bigger douche than his 616 counterpart.
- Maybe someone should tell Aleksei not to mess with Earth-65 Matt Murdock.
- (Someone should probably tell Gwen that, too).
- “You owe us blood, Rhino–we’re here to make you pay.”
- Oh man, this is it! This is the big moment…
- Ugh. Are you kidding me?
The Verdict
As expected, the artwork detailing Gwenom’s quest for revenge is all types of beautiful. The story was pretty darn good, as well…until it ended with a literal cop out.
Look, I don’t begrudge Jason Latour for the way he resolved the aforementioned “big moment.” He set it up well enough. It just seemed like a forced way to make sure we still get to see Gwen dealing with the consequences of her symbiote-enhanced rage without any actual consequences to speak of.
That being said, the “cop out” (you’ll get the pun after you read the issue, I promise) made for a visually stunning scene. I also thought the way Latour utilized Gwen’s life as a musician and the symbiote’s weakness to sound waves was absolutely brilliant. Let’s hope that the rest of the Gwenom story follows suit…or least for the art to keeping being so good.
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