Marvel has had quite the time playing “musical chairs” with the many symbiotes over the past few years. Long ago, Mac Gargan was Venom after Eddie Brock gave it up. Then Flash Thompson was Venom and Eddie Brock was Anti-Venom. Then some no name guy was Venom, until Eddie got the symbiote back. Then Eddie and his son Dylan were both Venom, and now Mary Jane is Venom (whew, that was a lot). While Carnage hasn’t had quite the same amount of hosts as Venom has, he’s also had a few notable ones (Silver Surfer and Ben Reilly being the biggest, if briefest), but the current status quo of the symbiote side of the Marvel universe has spun the wheel again, and the wheel has landed on Carnage joining forces with his “father”, Eddie Brock.
Wait, what?
Yes, the current status quo has two of Spidey’s greatest foes mashing together, and while on paper it sounds like another instance of Marvel throwing something out there, in execution it works surprisingly well. Under the creative team of writer Charles Soule and artists Jesus Saiz and Juanan Ramirez, the recently released Eddie Brock: Carnage‘s first volume, Killing Me, is a surprisingly fun and violent read, especially when it focuses on the titular symbiotic odd couple.
Following the events of Venom War, a mortally wounded Eddie Brock made a deal with the Carnage symbiote to ensure both of their survival. With his long experience with the creatures, Eddie believes he’s the best choice to be Carnage’s new host, since he can use his time as Venom to curb some of the creature’s more murderous inclinations. Yet Carnage is a non-stop nuisance in his brain, constantly imploring Eddie to give into his worst impulses and wipe out anyone and everyone around him. To keep the peace between them, Eddie works as an investigative reporter for a true crime podcast, searching the country for serial killers that he can take out. It keeps Carnage sated and Eddie feels like he’s doing some good in the world. But all that goes sideways when Eddie learns that Carnage has been keeping secrets from him, including a group of hostages from a plane crash the two survived, and the FBI is snooping around the crash site looking for leads on the mysterious passenger with a fake ID and no history. With the walls closing in around him, Eddie has to struggle with the question that worried him since he made the bond with Carnage: who’s really in charge?
Marvel
That question is the driving force behind Charles Soule’s script, and when the series focuses on it, it works extremely well. The constant back and forth between Eddie and Carnage is very entertaining, with the long history of the two characters coming into play throughout. Soule’s focus on these two and the psychological mind games they both play with one another is honestly the highlight of the series, so much so that if it was only these two bickering and pestering one another I’d still find a lot to like in it. The premise of Brock and Carnage tracking down superpowered killers is a great hook as well, but aside from a pretty brutal fight with Bushwhacker, that is cast aside in favor of the inner battle between Brock and Carnage (although there are some fun teases of future fights that will please longtime fans of Soule’s Daredevil run for sure). While the subplots involving the FBI and Brock’s employer slow the book down a little bit, they serve a good purpose in catching people up who are jumping into this from a curiosity factor. Questions like “why is Eddie working for a podcasting studio?” and “Wait, how did these two get connected?” are answered in entertaining ways through Soule’s script, and they thankfully don’t read like Wikipedia entries.
The art from Jesus Saiz and Juanan Ramirez is appropriately gruesome and brutal for a book starring a deadly symbiote killing other killers, yet I did prefer Saiz’s art just slightly over Ramirez’. Since he started off the book, I was able to get used to Saiz’ moody and atmospheric panels that evoked such serial killer classics like Se7en and Silence of the Lambs. While Juanen Ramirez’ style isn’t that different from Saiz’, it does lack that element that made the initial issues so interesting and appropriately stomach churning. However, the two issues that Saiz draws are slightly more action packed and feature some great moments within Brock’s psyche as Carnage tries to dig his way in to control Brock’s brain. Both artists are good fits for the book, but I would have liked both of them to get their own full arcs as opposed to splitting this one.
As someone who’s a little burnt out on the whole “symbiote merry-go-round” that Marvel has been up to, I was very surprised at how much I enjoyed Eddie Brock: Carnage Vol 1. A lot of that comes from Soule’s script finding the interesting character elements here. Under a lesser writer I could see this just being a “Carnage is Dexter now” type of comic, and while it does have that element, the real star is the fight for control between Eddie Brock and Carnage. This is one of those rare titles where the hook not only meets your expectations, but exceeds them.
You must be logged in to post a comment.