What I Read: Venom: THE MADNESS #3

Alright, hot on the heels of the surprisingly entertaining Venom 2-parter is a different Venom miniseries, "The Madness." You may be wondering why all the minseries...es. Y'see, instead of giving Venom his own series, Marvel just gave him miniseries after miniseries, the next beginning the month after the last ended, so he essentially had an uninterrupted 50-or-so issue solo series. This particular miniseries takes place before the one I looked at previously, so expect plenty of insane, unsympathetic, wanton carnage! LET'S GOOOOOOOOO

Venom: The Madness
"Part 3 of 3: NECROMANCER"
Written by Ann Nocenti
Penciled by Kelley Jones
Inked by J. Beatty, A. Milgrom, and K. Williams (awww hell)

Look at that cover. Venom's fighting the Juggernaut. RAAAAAAD. Heh, look at Venom's face in the upper left corner. Think he just sat on his nuts.

This is written by Ann Nocenti; she's a bit obscure, but she did a run on Daredevil after Frank Miller that apparently rivaled it in fantasticness, but nobody remembers it. I've read a few of her books, they're pretty good, so... might it be we'll have two relatively well-written 90s Venom comics in a row...?

Okay, so on the first page, Ghost Rider is ramming his bike into Venom's spine (at least I think that's what's happening, the art doesn't really convey a "slam" per se, and it's kind of hard to place the physics of a motorcycle lifting and carrying the Orca whale-sized Venom). He welcomes him to the REALM OF INSANITY, a place everyone visits at least a little bit when they lapse into insanity, but Venom's so much craaaaazier than usual that he's going to be trapped here for the rest of his life. Venom's got the kind of smile I imagine you'd get from seeing a cheeseburger for the first time in 20 years, so he may have a point.

"By the way, they call me Necromancer because I get off on killing!" I'm into pee, myself. Necromancer just swiped Ghost Rider's look because he rides through all the time and doesn't pick up hitchhikers. Venom argues with himself in various different fonts. A green-cloaked dude named Paranoia shows up and shoots bats at him, and Venom tries to convince him that he's not paranoid dammit, and he wonders why people are always, ALWAYS thinking that.

Back in San Francisco, Juggernaut is on the phone, really pissed off at his employer for making him sit still and guard the girl he kidnapped. He says he doesn't mind the work, unless he sits still and thinks about it. The girl tries to start a friendly conversation about how he's more than just hired muscle, but whatever let's just watch TV. The girl explains that she's sorta-kinda Venom's girlfriend, but she's worried that he's got a lot of problems, with the alien suit in his brain and all. Also he apparently fell into a toxic pit and got some kind of living virus that's driving him even crazier than usual. Damn, that's just the luck, isn't it?

Juggernaut says she's very nice, being sympathetic to ol' Venom even after he murdered a janitor for a corporation that she was suing. Her case is that they're using viruses to drive their employees mad, but I don't think there's any proof of THAT. The janitor was sitting in the president of the corporation's chair, and she had told Venom that the president was evil so... that sucks. Juggernaut tries to cheer her up by saying he's not COMPLETELY sure it was Venom who did the murdering. I'm liking Juggy here. OH MY GOD THE GOOD VENOM STREAK IS CONTINUING.

Paranoia keeps messing with Venom with snakes and bats and the like, but Venom grows claws and stabs him. That'll do it. Wait, so... apparently the morphing claws is part of the virus (that's one cool virus) though I'm pretty sure he could make all kindsa claws and spikes before. Also I think, like, the virus itself is talking to the suit and Brock is asleep or something? Crap. Anyhow, Ghost Rider shows back up and punches him in the face.

HAY ANYONE WANT TO BUY SOME WILLIAM SHATNER'S TEKWORLD TRADING CARDS?!?

Venom starts pounding him as the art goes to hell. His lower jaw is protruding out a good foot past his forehead, but it's not altogether unattractive, just exaggerated. A Morbius-looking guy named Dusk shows up, apparently he's the head honcho. He sends demonic versions of Spider-Man and Wolverine to fight him. Spidey makes sense, but Wolverine? Have they ever even met? Venom kinda goes even crazier or something and says he can turn being mad off like a lightswitch. Dusk says if he were sane the realm would have destroyed him (and also you can't go INTO the realm, but whatever), but by cleverly going insane he beat it, but he'll be back! Or something. Whatever, go fight Juggernaut.

In underground San Francisco, a homeless guy is sad because he told Venom he should kill the president of Evil Virus Corp. Oh well, whatcha gonna do. Back above ground, Venom's gf (and no, I don't know her name) is wondering who's at fault, the crazy guy with the virus making him crazier or the girl who offhandedly mentioned that some sleazy CEO was evil. Neither, stupid! The news reports that they found the big vats of mercury poisoning, so they're looking for the CEO and the kidnapped girl. Juggernaut's pissed because now he won't get paid, and the girl says she's sorry awwwwwwww.

The police have found Juggernaut (since he's 14 feet tall, wearing a costume, and standing in front of an open window), but the cops aren't really eager to go in and arrest him because he's bulletproof and what have you. Venom busts in and kicks Juggernaut in the head a bit, at which point he says he's not getting paid nearly enough for this shit and busts out through a wall. The gf stops him from going after him; she's one of those Leslie Thompkins pacifist types.

CAPTAIN AMERICA AND THE AVENGERS IS COMING TO SNES! MUST BUY!

Eddie's gf says that she forgives him but can't be intimate with him anymore, because when he gets riled up he gets a bit... homicidal. Venom initially get's all CRAZY PISSED but she sternly tells him to control himself, and he does. She says he's losing a gf, but gaining the best friend he ever had uggghhhhh. No, but actually it's pretty sweet.

The synopsis for Hulk #413 is "Hullllllk... Innnn... Spaaaaaace!" Sold.

Eddie goes back to the toxic waste pit and pushes the cancerous living virus out of his pores. He says if they ever want to hang again to just give him a call, but I don't think that can work really. In 30 days we can read Venom: The Enemy Within #1 with a glow-in-the-dark cover. Neat. Though if it still glows 17 years later I'll be impressed.

According to one letter writer, Venom is the man of the nineties.

Well, that kinda sucked. That's all the Venom, folks! My last of the five random Batman #700 replacement back issues has Thanos on the cover though, so you know it's good!