There are many side stories during this time with Peter in love with Black cat then MJ comes back into his life. In fact, the first half seems to be leading up to a climactic confrontation with the Hobgoblin, only to completely skip it once we finally know enough about the symbiote so that Venom actually makes sense.

I thought Eddie Brock was supposed to be a well-established character in the Spider-Man universe prior to bonding with the symbiote, but I guess I was wrong about that. Although the extent to which I knew this character only included his stint in the Spider-Man Playstation One game, I always held that he was the best villain in the Spider-Man universe.

It's not bad, but it barely hints at what's to come for Venom, and it's kind of a slog to get through. For an all Venom all the time kind of graphic novel, see Spider-Man: The Vengeance of Venom, which is cover-to-cover about Venom, or any number of his limited series like Venom: Lethal Protector.

Stern has written hundreds of stories about such diverse characters as Green Lantern, Supergirl, Starman, the Atom, and the Justice League for DC Comics; and Spider-Man, Captain America, Doctor Strange, the Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, and the Avengers for Marvel.This amount includes seller specified domestic postage charges as well as applicable international postage, dispatch, and other fees. The Fantastic Four find that the costume is actually a symbiote, which needs to bond to another host to survive. i like the stories as they certainly sound like classical mythology, i read the ‘synopses’ of things that happen but not shown then think of how fun it would be to just drop them out.

Starts with Spider-Man breaking a fight with some criminals and then he and Black Cat knock out the rest of them. Just because there's a new costume doesn't mean there isn't a ton of backstory you need, as this is a point where Parker was dating Black Cat, and was just friends with Mary Jane, and there's a new editor at The Bugle, and Parker's high school friend is fighting with his wife, who's a receptionist at The Daily Bugle, and Aunt May is dating someone and renting out her home as a senior living center. He woke up to find himself tied up in a huge web ball at the bell tower of the church he previously disposed of the symbiote.

Venom is only in a few issues in this entire thing as they show the build up of pretty much the entirety of Spidey in the black suit. He looked just as cool and creepy as I imagined he would look, and he did not disappoint in his battles with Spider-Man. I think that would have slightly helped this collection, since readers would not have been anticipating Venom the whole time and thus could not be disappointed when he only shows up at the very end. Modern readers looking for a history lesson might also be annoyed by the differences in certain key characters who are (obviously) suddenly missing a few decades worth of character development.

Great fun story, that gives more than just nostalgia if you read it back then, and with some amazing (YEAH THAT'S RIGHT) artwork to go along with it. Now being much older, I wanted to look into all of the Venom stories of the old comics that I was too young to appreciate before.When Eddie Brock enters the picture, than it starts becoming mind-numbingly fun with some great help from McFarlane sketchy art.