When it was announced that the Fear Agent team, Rick Remender and Tony Moore, were taking over an all-new Venom ongoing I got really excited. I loved the lunacy of their previous Marvel collaboration Franken-Castle, which really took my better judgement by surprise. Plus, Venom is the kind of character Moore could really excel at by drawing his exaggerated features. However, despite a decent script from Remender, the first issue didn’t completely live up to my expectations.

At this point in Marvel history, Venom is a Marvel canon anti-hero. The symbiote has attached itself most notably to two characters, Eddie Brock and Mac Gargan. Remender’s new plot follows the third major Venom host, Flash Thompson. Having revealed Thompson as the new host in “The Amazing Spider 654.1″(those point one issues do have major impact), Remender is able to jump straight into Thompson’s first Black-ops mission in the government owned Venom symbiote. The all-american Thompson is legless after an accident and the Venom symbiote briefly provides new legs while on missions. However, the government will only allow Thompson to use the symbiote for a designated amount of time to save him from being over taken as the Venom entity. His first mission is revealed to be a mere training session, and is viewed as a failure because Thomson chooses to save innocent bystanders and accidentally kills his target. However, it’s when Remender explores Thompson’s alcoholism at the end of the issue when the writer finds his voice in the series. Ending the issue with a quote by Charles Buxton, “A man’s venom poisons himself more than his victims,” Remender is exploring more than just the symbiote Venom, and sticks with the tradition of the classic Marvel character flaw.

[Concept art by Tony Moore]

Moore is the weaker link of the team in the debut issue. Though the artist does a fair job, I would like to see him get much more outrageous with Venom before he inevitably falls off the project to be replaced by another artist (most likely Jerome Opena). Hopefully, the next issue finds Venom slurping his floppy tongue all over the place in Moore’s signature style (who also happens to be one of my favorite artists and the reason I had high expectations for the series).

Also, if Remender wants to make Venom threaten to eat Spider-Man’s brain I’m perfectly okay with that. I’m certain Moore can draw ridiculous brain eating.

-Jon

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