Extreme Venomverse #5 // Review
Symbiote Summer begins to draw to a close at Marvel with Extreme Venomverse #5. The final issue of the weird symbiote anthology features a variety of different stories by some interesting teams. As with any anthology, it’s a hit-or-miss affair. Writer Kelly Thompson and artist Gurihiru open the issue with a story featuring Jeff the Landshark made more Venomy. The symbiote becomes caught up in the major leagues in a pleasantly weird baseball story written by Jordan Blum with artists Brian Crosby and Scott Hanna. Writer Cody Ziglar and artist Jim Towe roll a mecha version of Venom through an interesting mutation. Also: Jason Loo writes a story featuring art by Gavin Guidry.
Jeff is hanging out with Kate Bishop. She’s doing laundry and lecturing him on taking Lockjaw to the park, which...has GOT to be a weird situation--even for Marvel Manhattan. She turns around, and there he is, wearing a symbiote. She’s not ready for what comes next. Elsewhere, there’s a version of Eddie Brock who didn’t necessarily want to be an investigative journalist so much as...a sports reporter. He’s sneaking into a locker room to find something other than steroids being injected. Elsewhere still...first contact has been made, and the aliens are invading. One symbiote mecha may be all that stands between humanity and extinction at the hands of...well...a kaiju-sized symbiote menace.
Thompson writes a really fun Jeff and Kate story to open the issue. Wit is perfectly enjoyable in action and drama, but straight-ahead DEDICATED comedy is so very difficult to do in superhero format without being tedious. Thompson nails the humor perfectly on her way to a couple of new series this coming autumn with DC and another for Image. Much of the rest of the issue lacks Thompson’s unique punch. Ziglar’s mecha Venom is actually a pretty cool and trippy idea that doesn’t linger for any longer than it has to.
Once again, Gurihiru’s adorable rendering of Jeff gets a cool twist with the symbiote variant. Gurihiru’s brilliant sense of comedic timing fits Thompson’s humor perfectly. It’s the best feature in the book...maybe the series. Jeff has been fun with Gurihiru and Thompson in the It’s Jeff series, but it’s nice to see something a bit more substantial. Ziglar’s idea for a mecha Spawn fighting Spawn Gaiju is brought to the page with a clever poise and form courtesy of Jim Towe, who probably would have been MUCH better served with a few more pages. Really, the issue would have been fine with Jeff and the kaiju. The rest of it is kind of weak by comparison, either visually or conceptually.
It's remarkably strange how far things have come from the early 1990s. There used to be an arrow where the only real variants were on the covers. Shoot ahead a few decades, and now there are countless variations of nearly every major superhero and villain. Extreme Venomverse has been a weird exploration into this on the verge of the symbiote’s 40th anniversary this coming January. It’s been a weird journey. Some of it's been fun. Some of it has just been strange.
