The Klyntar race, otherwise known as symbiotes, are some of the most gnarly, fascinating and
downright scary beings in the Marvel multiverse.
Over the years, we’ve seen brand new iterations of some of these characters thanks to adventures
on alternate earths.
So today, we’re counting down the top 10 alternate versions of symbiotes better than
the original.
Now, take ‘better than the original’ with a grain of salt.
Many of these alternate versions of symbiotes (primarily Venom and Carnage alternates) are
quite unique, and perhaps more powerful than the original, or have received some adoration
for going above and beyond their namesake in the 616.
So with that in mind, let’s get to our list!
10 Old Man Logan Venom Let’s start our list off with an alternate
version that most of us can’t help but love – the venomized t-rex in Old Man Logan.
When Logan, who, if you haven’t read this alternate universe story, is old, and trying
to keep his family afloat, and also had retired his claws because he accidentally killed all
of the x-men, agrees to help take a now blind Hawkeye across America as a means of paying
back a debt to the hulk who is an asshole now, they cross through the savage land.
And whose in the savage land?
None other than a tyrannosaurus rex that Venom has bonded to.
It chases them, and only recently, we learned why Venom had beef with them.
It wasn’t just pure rage or hunger, but rather in the prequel Old Man Hawkeye, we
learn that Venom had bonded to multiple man.
He wanted revenge on hawkeye for killing some of his clones, and in the process, Hawkeye
and kate bishop had lured him into the wild, where he was devoured by a t-rex; the same
one he managed to bond with and then chase Hawkeye and Logan with.
9 Exomorph Rhino Here’s an alternate version that exists
within the 616 universe.
Mattie Franklin ends up taking on this concoction in 2000’s Spider-Woman volume 3 issue 11.
The Exomorph Rhino is an amalgamated version of Venom, Doc Ock and of course, Rhino.
Spider-woman ends up fighting against him, and in the process discovers that he can reshape
the environment with his brain, and Madam Web gets involved in the brawl as well.
While he’s not a version that manages to stick around all that long, he is scary AF,
and definitely proves to be a worthy foe of Mattie’s.
8 Magic Venom (616) Another alternate that popped up in the 616
– here we have magic venom.
So let’s back track a wee bit.
In Vemon volume 4 issue 13, after Eddie Brock was separated from Venom, he and his son end
up in the middle of Malekith’s invasion.
Eddie Brock decides to be a hero and takes them on, which draws the attention of one
of Malekith’s war witches, and gives him something called a Dreamstone, which grants
its holder the gift of having their dreams and desires brought to life.
So what happens?
Eddie wishes to become Venom once again, but this time, he’s got a new look because of
the stone – he’s lean, ghoulish and covered in spikes, of course.
The downside?
This version of Venom is murderous AF and has no mind of its own, causing some good
ol rampant fun.
7 A Pigeon Yes, yes, I’m sorry but we HAD to include
this on our list.
In the Spider-Cat universe, which appeared in Spider-Island I love New York City issue
1, we see a version of Spider-Man that is, in fact, a kitty cat.
YESSSSSSSSSSSSS.
YUUUUUUUSSS.
Sorry, it’s just so hilarious and wonderful to not mention.
And the alternate version of Venom that appears in this universe comes in the form of a pigeon.
Yes, this symbiote has bonded to a pigeon in New York city and it’s amazing.
When Spider-Cat is chilling on a roof top, his spider sense tingles, and sitting on a
phone line across from him is a pigeon, whom spider-cat declares “you’ve got a lot
of nerve coming her, venom pigeon.”
The two duke it out, there’s a slew of jokes about how many lives spider-cat has, and he
beats the crap out of the pigeon, only to reveal more venom pigeons.
And then we pull out in the panel to see that it’s all just a video game, except spider-cat
is real, and slinks out of a window putting on a mask to presumably fight more venom pigeons.
6 MC2 Carnage If you have a sick sense of humour like we
do, you’ll probably really enjoy the MC2 version of Carnage, otherwise known as Specimen
297.
In the MC2, Spider-Man is Spider-Girl, and Carnage bonds with her friend Moose Mansfied,
who wanted to use the symbiote to cure his father’s cancer.
It backfires a little, with the symbiote also infecting Spider-Girl’s little brother,
which was a bit of a mindf*ck for our heroine.
She eventually uses a sonic blaster to defeat Carnage, seemingly for good, but the symbiote
would appear later one in the timeline (sort of) when samples of it was used by the government
on a clone of Spider-Girl’s, who kills the real spider-girl and eventually becomes a
homicidal vigilante.
To be fair, there were a lot of dope venomized characters who first appeared in the Venomverse
story arc, and all of them are pretty great.
But for the sake of this list, we decided to go with Venomized X-23, or rather, a venomized
version of Laura Kinney which looked like a venomized wolverine.
Her origin story on her home of Earth 24398 begins fairly similar to the one we’re familiar
with from earth 616, except when she escapes the Weapon X facility, she does so by accidentally
freeing the venom symbiote, who then bonds with her and helps her gain her freedom.
On the run, she befriends some street kids who she ends up sharing parts of the symbiote
with in order to help protect them prior to her being recruited by a venomized captain
America to help fight against the poisions in the main venomverse storyline.
4 Ultimate Marvel Carnage (1610) The ultimate universe on earth 1610 is home
to modernized and much more grim versions of marvel characters.
Praised for how dark and raw much of it felt, it was also the home to a terrible story event
that pretty much caused its downfall, Ultimatium, which saw a slew of unnecessary character
deaths.
All that aside, it gave us versions that we absolutely adore, including Ultimate Carnage.
This version of carnage is a self-regenerating vampiric organism.
Whaaaat, right?
Absolutely bananas.
It was created from the DNA of Peter Parker and the Lizard, with the organism only wanting
to feed on the DNA of others in order to stabilise itself.
Eventually, it turns into a damaged form of Richard Parker, Peter’s dad, causing a particularly
brutal brawl between the two.
3 Spider-Man 2099 Hailing from Earth 928, which takes place
in the year 2099, this alternate version of Venom who appears in the Spider-Man 2099 comics
is Kron Stone, who just happens to be Spider-Man Miguel O’Hara’s older half brother.
Kron was abused as a child by their android housekeeper, and was so unstable that he actually
tried to kill Miguel after he discovered that Miguel was his half brother.
He was almost murdered, but as he lay in a sewer, he was saved by the venom symbiote
who bonded with him.
The symbiote mutated over the years, giving Kron new abilities compared to the 616 venom,
which includes acidic blood and salvia.
How very Alien.
Their whole story is really messed up, and eventually, the symbiote ditches Kron and
bonds with the son of Namor, fleeing into the ocean, never to be seen again, although
later on, part of the symbiote itself was studied at the Alchemax lab.
2 Venomized Galactus (616) Venomized Galactus is yet another alternate
version that makes an appearance on our list, although a short lived appearance, unfortunately,
despite looking super dope.
This version came to be when Mysterio creates an illusion of a venomized Galactus while
fighting Spider-Man in Web of Spider-Man issue 90 volume 1 from 1992, which just so happened
to be Spider-Man’s 30th anniversary (with a holographic cover!
Gotta love the 90s).
Anywhoggle, Mysterio creates a bunch of different illusions to mess with Peter’s head, including
this fella, who shouts out ‘we are MAD now, Spider!
Venom will be the star!
We are going to crush you like the little bug that you are for good!”
1 Ultimate Venom (1610) Introduced in Ultimate spider-man issue 33,
this version of Venom from Earth 1610 was literally designed to look monstrous versus
looking like a super villain, described by his creators as a “huge cancerous tumorous
creature.”
And that’s pretty on point – just look at him!
The ultimate Venom isn’t fully sentient like the 616 venom, but it still has a will
of its own and can act independently of whoever it is bonded to.
When bonded, Eddie Brock described the experience as having two minds; his own and another filled
with nothing but ravenous hunger.
The other neat thing about it is that it had an overwhelming desire to be bonded to or
to consume Spider-Man, and was willing to ditch whatever host it was bonded to in order
to achieve this desire (and it didn’t matter if it was Peter Park or Miles Morales, this
Venom wanted both of those boys).
There we have it friends!
What other alternate versions of a symbiote character surprised you?
Which ones are your favourites, and which ones do you detest?
Give us a shout in those comments below and let us know your thoughts and feels!
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