Edward Brock (Earth-616)edit this page

From Marvel Database

History

As a child, Edward Allan Charles Brock was raised as a Roman Catholic in San Francisco. His father was cold and unloving towards him because he blamed Eddie for his wife's death during childbirth. Eddie constantly attempted to obtain his father's approval, though even after excelling in school, he only received half-hearted encouragements. Though exceptional in athletics, Brock switched his major in college to journalism after reading an article on the Watergate scandal. Upon graduating, he moved to New York City and as a member of the Associated Press, he obtained a job as a journalist for the Daily Globe. He proved himself to be highly talented, though even this did not get his father's approval.^[4] He eventually married Anne Weying, who was attracted by his wit and docility.

Contents 1 History 1.1 From Success to Failure 1.2 Birth of Venom 1.3 Stalking the Spider 1.4 Short Reprieve and an Uneasy Alliance 1.5 "Final Confrontation" 1.6 The Lethal Protector 1.7 The Hunger 1.8 Return to Villainy 1.9 Life with Cancer and the "Inner Venom" 1.10 Brand New Day 1.11 Anti-Venom 1.12 New Ways To Live 2 Powers and Abilities 2.1 Powers 2.2 Abilities 2.3 Strength level 2.4 Weaknesses 3 Paraphernalia 3.1 Equipment 3.2 Transportation 4 Notes 5 Trivia 6 Links 6.1 Discover and Discuss 7 References

From Success to Failure

Brock had been a successful columnist for the newly revived Daily Globe until he began writing a series of articles about the "Sin-Eater murders." While protecting the "murderer’s" identity under the First Amendment, Brock wrote a series of stories in the Globe detailing his dialogue with the supposed killer, until mounting pressure from the authorities forced him to write an exclusive revealing the murderer's name. Although that edition of the paper sold out immediately, Spider-Man soon revealed the true identity of the Sin-Eater to be Detective Stan Carter (the man Brock had been interviewing was actually a compulsive confessor), making Brock a laughingstock among his fellow journalists. Fired from the Daily Globe, he was forced to write venomous drivel for scandal newspapers. Brock's wife left him, his father disowned him and his future appeared to be over. Brock blamed all of these problems on Spider-Man. Soon after, Brock began an intense physical workout program hoping to reduce the stress his life had become. However, such physical exertions only increased his violent obsession with Spider-Man. Although his body had been honed to near-perfection, Brock’s mind was reduced to an all-consuming vessel of hatred.

Birth of Venom

Some time after Eddie's life took these drastic changes, Spider-Man brought the alien symbiote to the tower at Our Lady of Saints Church gambling the intense sound of its bells would destroy it. Spider-Man lost the gamble, and he succumbed to the bells before the costume did. However, the empathic parasite had preyed upon the emotions of Spider-Man long enough to learn how to feel, and in feeling, to act. Sacrificing itself, the alien costume saved Spider-Man, who assumed it then, crawled away to die. In actuality the symbiote, weak and dying, slithered down into the church where Eddie Brock knelt in prayer at the altar. Raised a Catholic, he begged forgiveness for the suicide he was contemplating.

It was the fierce hate emanating from Brock that attracted the empathic parasite. In order to survive, the alien costume had to feed off the nearest and greatest source of emotion. The symbiote joined mentally and physically with Brock, whose emotions overwhelmed the already confused alien. The dominant thought on both their minds was that of Spider-Man. But Brock’s sheer hatred for the crime fighter twisted the symbiote’s feelings to a similar extent. In effect, Brock’s emotions drove the symbiote insane, just as their bonding may have driven Brock over the edge. Brock soon discovered that the costume gave him all the powers of Spider-Man, and more. It also added bulk to his already large frame and increased his strength to superhuman levels. Calling himself "Venom," Brock directed the costume to sprout a hideous grin and plotted his revenge. Through the costume, Venom learned a great deal about Spider-Man, including his secret identity.

Stalking the Spider

Brock taunted Peter Parker with minor assaults, such as pushing him in front of a moving subway train. The alien costume could cancel out the wall-crawler’s spider-sense presumably by projecting conflicting frequencies upon Spider-Man's brain waves. Venom finally made a bold move when he confronted Parker’s wife, Mary Jane, at their old Chelsea apartment. Although Venom’s twisted sense of morality did not allow him to physically harm Mary Jane, Spider-Man immediately realized the nature of this threat. Taking the time to retrieve the sonic blaster from the Fantastic Four, Spider-Man challenged Venom at Our Lady of Saints Church. Although he fired the blaster at Venom, Spider-Man soon discovered that the symbiote could not be separated from Brock because it had completely bonded with him. Trying to escape and rethink his options, Spider-Man was caught unawares by Venom. He captured Spider-Man and secured him to the inside of the church bell with a considerable amount of webbing. Spider-Man narrowly escaped the bell’s crushing clapper before defeating Venom by forcing him to deplete his webbing supply, of which the alien symbiote was actually comprised. Before the alien could regenerate enough of its mass to become a renewed threat, Spider-Man brought Venom to the Fantastic Four who imprisoned him in a sonic containment cell. The Fantastic Four then shipped Venom to the government super-prison in the Colorado Rockies called the Vault. A young guard who had just been assigned to the Vault was fooled into thinking that Venom was a fallen colleague and released the gate mechanism, which imprisoned the criminal. Venom killed the naive guard and escaped to New York City, where he once again confronted Spider-Man. This time Spider-Man used psychological warfare upon Venom, by taunting the alien symbiote to return to him. The alien, torn by its love-hate relationship for Spider-Man, tried to leave Brock and to re-establish its link with its original owner, but the trauma of trying to detach itself from Brock’s nervous system was too much to bear. The alien costume and Eddie Brock were both knocked unconscious and subsequently returned to the Vault, where they were incarcerated.

The next fight, Venom went after Spider-man around the same time Jonathon Caesar, an insane and obsessed fan of Mary Jane Watson-Parker, sent two mercenaries Styx and Stone, after the wall-crawler. Venom unintentionally became involved in the plot when the two attempted to follow him through the sewers in the hope of finding Spider-man. Unfortunately for them, Venom escaped the sewers in his human guise. After yet another fight with Spider-man, Styx and Stone found the two and attempted to kill Spider-man. Fortunately for Spidey, albeit in a bad way, Venom would not allow anyone else to kill Spider-man, save himself. Attacking the two, a brawl ensued before Styx, the living cancer, touched his symbiote, killing it in the process. With the symbiote seemingly dead, Eddie Brock was sent to a normal prison.

Short Reprieve and an Uneasy Alliance

Later it was revealed the symbiote was merely sent into a comatose state, apparently immune to Earthly diseases. Returning to Eddie Brock the two easily escaped. In the breakout, however, the suit left a small spawn behind it which would bond with Eddie's cellmate, Cletus Kasady. No one would be aware of this new threat for months. Eddie brought Spider-man to an island in the Caribbeans, away from people and innocents in the hope of killing him alone. However, Spider-man later realized that Venom would only be happy if he knew that Spider-man was dead. Faking his death, Spider-man made Venom believe that he had died. Happy at last Venom saw there was no reason to return to civilization, having all he needed on the island, and stayed there.

In a plan to help his father, Darkhawk hijacked a cargo plane which crashed onto the island. The two fought mostly because Venom desired privacy. After the symbiote sensed Powell's innocence, misled the hero into thinking he was dead (ironically in a similar manner to how Spider-man deceived him.)^[5]

A few months later however, the megalomaniacal serial killer known only as Carnage began a mass-murdering rampage throughout Manhattan, killing hundreds of people. Spider-man attempted to stop him, but swiftly learned that despite his superior experience he was outmatched. Realizing that Carnage possessed a symbiote, Peter reluctantly realized that he needed Venom's help in order to stop this menace. Contacting Johnny Storm, the Human Torch, they traveled to the Caribbean Island where Venom resided. When Venom realized that Spider-man was alive, he attacked the two. After a brief spat Venom listened to what Spider-man had to say. Promising to help Spider-man stop Carnage in exchange for his freedom, Spider-man reluctantly agreed starting the first of many uneasy alliances with each other.

Returning to New York, Venom and Spider-man attempted to stop Carnage's rampage twice with equal failure. In their final attempt at Madison Square Garden they stopped Carnage after he began trying to kill J. Jonah Jameson. Turning on the sound system to the maximum frequency, Spider-man stopped Carnage. He then proceeded (albeit reluctantly) to use the sound waves on Venom before he attacked him, still possessing enough hatred and strength to choke him. His attempt to kill the wall-crawler however, was stopped by the Fantastic Four who Venom realized were behind this plan all along. Venom's hatred for Spider-man now grew greater than ever.

"Final Confrontation"

After years of fighting, Venom finally sought Spider-Man in what was meant to be their last battle to end it all. Venom kidnapped his parents (much later revealed to be genetic clones) in order to protect their innocence from his corruption.^[6] Spider-Man contacted Eddie's ex-wife, Annie, in order to gain info on his whereabouts, which led Spider-Man to Thrill World where he found Venom waiting. Eddie noticed Annie, who traveled there to try reaching him one last time. An amusement ride fell next to Annie and Eddie couldn't hold it on his own. As Eddie started to falter Spider-Man assisted him in holding the tremendous weight, and together they tossed the ride aside. Afterward Venom began to resume the fight with Spider-Man, but Annie stopped him, reminding Eddie that Spider-Man just saved an innocent life. Pondering this fact for a moment, Eddie realized that by not killing Spider-Man, more innocent lives could be saved. Venom then made a deal with him: So long as Spider-Man did not go after them, they would not go after him. Agreeing to the terms, Spider-Man watched as Venom attached a web line to a nearby helicopter, departing for a new city where he wouldn't interfere.^[7]

The Lethal Protector

After dealing a truce with Spider-Man, Venom relocated to his home town of San Francisco. Some cops recognize Eddie Brock and try to bring him in, but he turns into Venom and resists arrest, incapacitating them. Parker reads about how Venom’s beating up police officers and breaks the truce by going to find him. Venom saved a handful of homeless people from being abused by criminals, and in gratitude revealed their underground society descended from survivors of the 1906 San Francisco Earthquake. After fighting the Jury he was taken prisoner by the Life Foundation, and forcefully made to spawn five more symbiotes. With the help of Spider-Man, he escaped the prison and managed to incapacitate the other symbiotes. The man responsible for the Life Foundation and the symbiotes, Roland Treece, planned on killing the underground civilization in order to obtain a large mass of gold supposedly buried within it. Enlisting Spider-Man's aid once again the two thwarted his evil scheme. During his period of vigilantism, Eddie crossed paths with other superheros and anti-heroes such as the Punisher, Wolverine,^[8] Daredevil,^[9] Iron Man,^[10] Morbius,^[11] Mace ^[12] and Vengeance.^[13]

Eddie became romantically involved with Beck Underwood, a lawyer and above-ground contact of the underground society. A company called Scarmore Inc. was behind some illegal experiments in which they tried to mix their toxic waste with mercury, however all the substance did was sicken anyone who worked with it, both physically and mentally. Scarmore Inc. hired Black Tom and Juggernaut to take her out, but Venom confronted the mercenaries.

The Mercury Virus turned out to be sentient. Venom landed in a pool of the Mercury Virus which proceeded to bond with him and augmented his strength drastically while simultaneously turning him insane. Venom broke into the Scarmore building at night and killed the president of the company, who was actually just a janitor resting in his chair. Juggernaut confronted him, and the two fought until Venom fell into another dimension called the Realm of Insanity. A necromancer (taking the appearance of Ghost Rider) explained that every time someone went mad they fell into the Realm of Insanity for an amount of time, and the degree of Venom's madness meant he could remain there indefinitely. Venom negotiated with Dusk, ruler of the realm, and was sent back to Earth.

Juggernaut was holding Beck hostage. Venom burst in and attacked Marko, and the two fought until Juggernaut got fed up and left. Due to all that had happened Beck ended their relationship and Venom extracted the Mercury Virus from his system. Despite everything, Venom respected the sentient virus and welcomed a reunion if he ever needed another power boost.^[14]

The Hunger

During his wandering of New York, deprived of sleep, Eddie grew more and more delusional with people appearing as demons and monsters to him. Everything he ate tasted like garbage, and he had a craving for something but did not know what it was. Using his old resources and skills as journalist to find trouble, he went to a bar filled with the corrupt and started a fight for the sake of punishing the guilty and working up an appetite. He took down everyone in the bar fight with little effort, and proceeded to feed on one of the mens' brains, however hearing the other bar patron's screams snapped him out of his feeding. To Eddie’s disgust, he felt the symbiote asking him for more; Eddie stood up to his other and refused to feed it. The symbiote separated from Eddie and went off on its own. In his attempts to warn the innocents of New York about the alien, Eddie (nude without the symbiote) was arrested.^[15] He was eventually handed over to Doctor Paine.

Paine thought that Eddie had organic brain syndrome, but unknown proteins in his system, enlarged pores and a severe lack of phenethylamine in his brain proved otherwise. Paine listened to Eddie, and he was allowed to leave the hospital (due to Paine's ulterior motives.) Eddie stocked up on different supplies so as to better combat his "other," since he decided that he could not live with what it had become. Their mental link allowed Eddie to see through its attempt to ambush him and Eddie first tried to talk to the creature, but it raged at him and he had no choice but to fight it. Eventually he downed the alien and had it at his mercy. Stating the symbiote was sick he gave it a dose of phenethylamine, which he overheard Dr. Paine mention. Having eaten away all it could leech from Eddie, the symbiote needed it from other sources. The other brains couldn’t feed it nearly as much as Eddie’s due to his emotional attachment, and after digesting it the alien calmed down.

Dr. Paine and his Orderlies ambushed them, took the symbiote and left Eddie. After escaping an explosion he sensed that Paine was torturing & experimenting on the symbiote. He snuck into the complex and found the symbiote and freed it to become Venom again. With his powers returned Venom defeated the Orderlies before impaling Doctor Paine. Wanting to torture him, Paine retorted to Venom that he wouldn’t be able to feel any of it; in response, Venom absorbed all the phenethylamine from the doctor's brain leaving him with an insatiable hunger for brains. Eddie later found that chocolate was also a good source of phenethylamine, removing the need to feed.

Return to Villainy

Venom was recruited via an ultimatum by the government to be a special operations counter-terrorist agent. Venom agreed, but one stipulation of the deal did not sit too well with him. A bomb was planted in his chest to assure complete and utter obedience. After a few missions, Venom became tired of the situation and had the symbiote perform surgery on him and extracted the bomb. A brouhaha ensued wherein the end result was Eddie Brock lying unconscious and the symbiote "dead," only to return later on and re-join with Eddie. Thus Venom was whole again and looking to square things with Spider-Man once again. He had lost his memory and no longer knew the secret identity of Spider-Man, but knew that a deep seated hatred resided within him for the wall crawler.

Shortly after the reunion, Venom joined the Sinister Six for a brief period in order to get at Spider-Man. After being scorned by the group, he hunted down certain members of the team for revenge (including Electro, the Sandman, and Kraven the Hunter (Alyosha Kravinoff).) Later Eddie Brock approached his ex-wife Anne Weying, and at the thought of having the symbiote back in her life she jumped out of her apartment window and killed herself. Venom blamed Spider-Man, whom he had a skirmish with right before Anne died. Thus the hatred for the old Web-Head was fueled anew.

Life with Cancer and the "Inner Venom"

After an extended period of inactivity, Venom resurfaced with cancer, and the only thing keeping him alive was the symbiote, who did not want him anymore. After seeing a spiritual movie, Eddie decided to sell his symbiote off in an auction, swearing off his life of vigilantism. The winner of the auction was the the gang lord Don Fortunato. He gave the symbiote to his son, Angelo, in hopes that Angelo would finally make a name for himself. The symbiote eventually left Angelo to die in mid-air. The symbiote passed on to Mac Gargan, the Scorpion. Brock was discovered after making an attempt to kill himself, and was hospitalized.

He was rapidly succumbing physically to his cancer and experiencing hallucinations of the symbiote, representing his dark side. After a while of being tormented by his other, he spotted Mary Jane Watson Parker watching over Aunt May who had been seriously wounded by a bullet. Eddie had no idea what to do, but his dark side then persuaded him to order a black suit similar to Peter's and put it on, apparently making the decision that may forever damn him.

Making a decision to go and try to murder Aunt May while she was in a coma, Eddie Brock embodied the black costume and set out to kill her, first murdering a nurse for getting in his way. But after sneaking into Aunt May's room, Brock had a change of heart, finding he could not murder someone as innocent as Aunt May. Peter entered the room moments later to find Brock sitting on the shattered window, having slit his own wrists dozens of times. Believing he had done too many terrible things to live on he jumped off, but Peter broke his fall by catching him. Awakening chained to his bed, Brock decided to take better control of himself for the remaining days he had left.

Brand New Day

Edie started working for Mr. Li and Aunt May at the F.E.A.S.T. center. There he worked serving food to the homeless. Thanks to Mr.Li's "mysterious powers." Eddie was cured of both his cancer and the remnants of the symbiote. Unfortunately, the current Venom entered the F.E.A.S.T. center looking for Spider-man. He found Eddie and the symbiote began to crawl onto him again. However, Mr. Li's powers clash with the takeover and they formed Anti-Venom. Later in a fight against Spider-man, he noticed his foe rescue an innocent old man. Inspired, Anti-venom helped Spidey cure the current Venom. He engaged Venom in a fight, and after receiving some help from Spider-Man, cured Gargan from the symbiote, but also felt some remnants of the symbiote inside Peter's blood and began "curing" him as well, but also ended up sucking the radiation from Spider-Man's blood, something that might depower him.

Later, Thunderbolts guards arrived to took the disabled Gargan to the ship while Songbird and Radioactive Man battled Spider-Man and Anti-Venom. After the fight, Anti-Venom snuck on the Thunderbolts ship and stole back Peter Parker's camera, looted by Norman Osborn in a bid to reverse engineer the tracing system allowing the camera to zero on Spider-Man's chest. He was able to help Peter escape Osborn's tracer and forewarns him about the villain's next move in a show of friendship and good-will.

Anti-Venom

Anti-Venom led Spider-Man to Oscorp and the two split up. Brock disguised himself as Spider-Man to distract the other Thunderbolts while Spider-Man went after Osborn. After webbing up Songbird and Radioactive Man to a wall, Anti-Venom faced Gargan, who was now wearing a new Scorpion battlesuit to protect his recovering symbiote. After a grueling battle Gargan, as Scorpion, hit Anti-Venom with his stinger and injected a poisonous formula that seemingly destroyed Brock's symbiote. Gargan (now Venom) advanced to kill Brock but was met with resistance by his Venom symbiote. The symbiote gained strength and broke though Gargan's battle suit, refusing to let Gargan kill Brock. Gargan explained that the alien still loved Brock too much and gave up, but he promised Brock that he would get past this problem and someday finish him off, to which Brock replied "not if I kill you first." Unknown to Gargan, Brock's Anti-Venom suit reformed. Now a fugitive for helping Spider-Man and fighting the Thunderbolts, Brock was back on the streets, planning to continue his former vigilante antihero career with seemingly increased religious emphasis as The Anti-Venom. He even cured a young girl, Jenna Cole, from her heroin addiction.

Brock was the first person to find out that Martin Li was Mister Negative. In the end, Eddie questioned his own faith and cried out that no one would believe him, because he was a monster.^[16]

New Ways To Live

Working with Jenna Cole, Eddie fought crime in the sleazier areas of New York, having separated themselves from the F.E.A.S.T. foundation. As Anti-Venom he would "cure" the streets of drug traders after Jenna would go undercover to lure them out. He became increasingly unstable mentally, reverting back to his "Venom" personality and was overtly/near lethally protective of Jenna. At a drug bust Eddie walked in on the Quintas gang after they had captured Jenna, preparing to transform until the Punisher intervened. Anti-Venom and Castle slaughtered the criminals until a gang member took Jenna hostage. Eddie stopped Castle from shooting the gang member through Jenna, however upon hearing his full name (Eddie Brock the serial killer) he shot Anti-Venom in the head with a shotgun. Anti-Venom recovered and attacked the Punisher in retaliation. Eddie and the Punisher almost killed each other, but Eddie declared a truce, saying that if the Punisher didn't back down he'd make him go to Mexico with him in a wheelchair and that he could drive the Punisher's van. The Punisher agreed to the truce, but tried to kill Eddie again during the border crossing with a knife. He dropped Eddie off at the compound, figuring Eddie would die instead of him, and this way he planned to take care of two birds with one stone. When he talked on the phone to the leader of the Quintas gang and found that Jenna had relapsed and was doing drugs again, Eddie lost control and tore one of the Quintas in half in a fit of rage. After killing the remaining guards, Eddie rejoined the Punisher, and the two launched an attack on the Quintas. At the end of the raid, Eddie found a severely drugged Jenna, who seemed afraid of his Anti-Venom costume. After withdrawing the symbiote into himself, Eddie managed to calm her down. At this point, the Punisher attempted to snipe Eddie from a distance, but ultimately decides not to, later he had found out he had ran out of ammo. After the Punisher left, Jenna and Eddie took a jeep and returned home. ^[17]

Powers and Abilities

Powers

Venom (Formerly): Eddie Brock was the first individual truly bond with the symbiote, seeing as Peter Parker did not allow it to complete the process, gaining many of the same powers Spider-Man possessed in conjunction with the symbiote's natural abilities.

• Symbiotic Costume: The alien costume, which has grafted itself to the nervous system of Eddie Brock, somehow absorbed the powers of Spider-Man during its brief symbiotic relationship with him. These powers have now been transferred to Brock, so long as he wears the costume.

• Superhuman Strength: Before he came into contact with the costume, Brock had conditioned himself to lift (press) 700 lb.^[18] Once they merged, the costume added Spider-Man’s superhuman strength to Brock’s vast human strength, making him more powerful than Spider-Man. However, his full strength often fluctuates. Venom has demonstrated strength ranging from only slightly greater than Spider-Man's to being capable of trading blows with high-powered individuals such as Juggernaut. This is caused by the several mutations that the symbiote took with Brock, gaining additional bulk and muscle mass over long periods of time with its host.

• Superhuman Durability: Venom's body is highly resistant to physical injury, capable of withstanding assault from high-caliber bullets as well as attacks from super powered individuals. When distributed at a typical thickness over Brock's body, the Symbiote is capable of absorbing bullets from small-arms weapons firing conventional ammunition. The Symbiote is however particularly vulnerable to both sonic and heat-based attacks.

• Superhuman Stamina: Venom is also capable of surviving in harmful areas for long periods of time such as underwater or in toxic gases, the symbiote filtering breathable air to the host.

• Accelerated Healing Factor: Additionally, the symbiote is capable of healing injuries in the host at a faster rate than normal human healing allows. The symbiote is also capable of healing injuries and illnesses that current human medical care cannot such as cancer.

• Genetic Memory: The symbiote possesses some limited psychic ability, making it capable of obtaining information from its hosts and even other people and symbiotes simply by touch. This ability allowed Eddie Brock to know the secret identity of Spider-Man when the symbiote bonded with him. It can however, be forced to forget information if the symbiote is inflicted with heavy trauma.

• Offspring Detection: The symbiote is also capable of psychically detecting its offspring, however with effort this ability can be blocked.

• Wall-Crawling: The alien costume also replicates Spider-Man’s ability to cling to walls by controlling the flux of inter-atomic attraction between molecular boundary layers.

• Webbing Generation: Venom can shoot strands of the alien’s substance in the form of "webbing" at high pressure up to a distance of 70 feet. The alien’s substance seems to be composed of tough, flexible fibers of organic polymers, which regenerate swiftly after "shedding." The strands have extraordinary adhesive properties, which diminish rapidly once they abandon their living source. After about three hours, with no source to nourish them, the strands dry up like dead skin and dissolve into a powder. The strands possess a tensile strength of 125 pounds per square millimeter of cross section. The one limitation to this ability was used to Spider-Man's advantage during their second bout; Since the webbing itself comprises the costume, if Venom generates too much he will be left vulnerable as the symbiote is weakened and unable to replenish his lost mass for a short period of time. In addition to creating webbing, Brock can use the symbiote in the form of tentacles or tendrils to attack or ensnare his opponents.

• Constituent-Matter Generation: Venom can also use the same substance comprising the symbiote in the form of constituent black matter or goo, and uses it in this method for lethal force against criminals. Venom can send a part of the symbiote and direct its movements into a victim's body, smothering them from the inside. ^[19]
  

  

  The symbiote taking the form of clothing.

• ESP (Spider-Sense): Venom also possesses an extrasensory ability similar to Spider-Man’s spider-sense. This response is not as complicated as Spider-Man’s inherent sense since the alien costume can detect danger from every direction and conduct Brock in plenty of time. It is not as efficient as Spider-Man’s spider-sense because it takes longer to communicate the danger, and Brock’s reflexes are not as fast as Spider-Man’s, even though they are enhanced by the alien costume. It is unknown whether Venom could dodge a gunshot or a barrage of bullets. It should be noted that as Ben Reilly was cloned from Peter before he bonded with Venom, Eddie was not immune to his spider sense.

• Immunity to Spider-man's Spider Sense: Due to Spider-Man being a host to the symbiote, Venom, and as a result his offspring, is able to bypass Spider-Man's spider-sense. As such, Venom is capable of attacking Spider-Man without alerting him, making Venom a deadly foe.

• Camouflage Capabilities: The symbiote is capable of mimicking the appearance of any form of clothing, camouflaging with its surroundings, and even mimicking other people. Brock's preferred form of clothing was a black shirt, jacket and pants.

• Poisonous Fangs: An ability developed by Eddie Brock upon bonding with the symbiote. Originally he commanded the symbiote to sprout a maniacal grin and tongue, differentiating him from Spider-Man. Later it is revealed that this set of fangs not only intimidates foes but can deliver a powerful, venomous bite (true to Brock's namesake). This bite was able to cripple the Sandman, eventually leaving the villain turned hero unable to reform himself properly, presumably causing his death.^[20]

Anti-Venom (Current):

When the symbiote chose to separate itself from him, Eddie's cancer began spreading at an exponential rate. After the events of Brand New Day, Mr. Li cured him of his cancer and due to the remnants of symbiote left in his body, Eddie developed new powers. These remnants fused with Eddie's white blood cells resulting in a new white symbiote that grants Eddie the majority of his old powers along with powerful new ones as Anti-Venom.

• White Symbiotic Costume: The alien costume's remnants remained grafted to the nervous system of Eddie Brock, and fused with his white blood cells. This new white symbiote seems to not only be different in appearance abilities, but even acts completely different from the original symbiote it evolved from. For instance, Eddie Brock refers to himself in first person as Anti-Venom, and is in complete control of his actions. This relationship is somewhat similar to Cletus Kasady's and the Carnage symbiote: Both symbiotes are bonded to their hosts at the cellular level and seem to compliment the user's personality (the Carnage symbiote loves to kill, and the Anti-Venom symbiote wants to destroy Venom.) However the white symbiote, unlike the other members of its race, seemingly has no influence on Eddie's actions, which is a far cry from his first symbiotic relationship.

• External Symbiote Rejection: Upon being assaulted by Mac Gargan, the Venom symbiote attempts to leave Gargan to bond with Brock again. However Brock's skin is caustic to his former symbiote, which means the white symbiote has the ability to reject the Venom symbiote and presumably all of its children as well.

• Constituent-Matter Manipulation: Anti-Venom can manipulate his matter to enlarge or stretch his body in order to augment his attacks. For example, he enlarged his fist and slammed it into the MacGargan creating more of an impact.

• Impurity Sense: Anti-Venom can sense foreign substances within a person's body which includes symbiotes, radiation, narcotics, viruses and diseases.
• Internal Bodily Cleansing: After sensing the impurity, Anti-Venom can forcefully "cure" the substance from the person's body. He uses this ability to almost completely destroy his old symbiote and to cure a young girl from her heroin addiction. This power can also be used to depower some superhumans, almost ridding Spider-Man of the radiation in his blood when attempting to destroy remnants of the symbiote, and nearly cleanses Radioactive Man of his powers in a similar fashion.

• Spider-Power Negation: After failing to cleanse Spider-Man of his symbiote remnants and radiation in his blood, whenever Anti-Venom is too close to Peter his powers are effectively canceled until Eddie becomes distant enough from him.

Excluding these new powers granted by the white symbiote, Anti-Venom still retains almost every power Eddie had bonded with the Venom symbiote, including:

• Superhuman Strength
• Superhuman Durability
• Superhuman Stamina
• Accelerated Healing Factor
• Wall-Crawling
• ESP (Spider-Sense)
• Immunity to Spider-man's Spider Sense
• Webbing Generation
• Camouflage Capabilities

Power Grid [21] Intelligence  2 Strength 4  Speed  3 Durability 5  Energy Projection  1 Fighting Skills  2

Abilities

Expert Reporter: Before his bonding with the symbiote, Eddie Brock was an incredibly skilled reporter for the Daily Globe, and knew how to investigate. He also had many sources of information in helping with his plans.

Strength level

Class 60 (As Anti-Venom); Eddie Brock worked his body to peak human conditioning, able to lift 700 lb before his bonding with the Symbiote.^[22] Venom possessed superhuman strength enabling him to lift about 11 tons^[23], however judging on some of the beings he has tangled with it appears his strength fluctuates. As Anti-Venom he is roughly as strong as Venom(Gargan) if not stronger as he was successfully able to trade punches; this would theoretically enable him to lift up to 40 tons.^{[24] [25]}

Weaknesses

• Osborn's Cure: As the Anti-Venom, he can only be weakened by poisons that infect the body. The white symbiote takes the damage leaving Eddie powerless. Norman created the virus using Freak's DNA.
• Mental Instability: Eddie has been repeatedly shown relapsing into his unstable "lethal protector" mindset. Recently as Anti-Venom he's seemingly reverted back to this persona, killing criminals just as offhandedly as before despite the obvious option of curing them of their drug addictions and actually helping them with his powers.
  

Paraphernalia

Equipment

• The White Symbiote

  Transportation

• Web-slinging.
  

Notes

• Eddie Brock first appeared in Web of Spider-Man #18; as Venom in Amazing Spider-Man #299; and Anti-Venom in Amazing Spider-Man #569
  

Trivia

• Eddie's full name is Edward Allan Charles Brock. In the MC2 universe, he names his son; Christian Nathaniel Alexander Brock

Links

• Appearances of Edward Brock (Earth-616)
• Character Gallery: Edward Brock (Earth-616)
• Images that feature Edward Brock (Earth-616)
• Fan-Art Gallery: Edward Brock (Earth-616)
• Quotations by Edward Brock (Earth-616) 
• Venom of Spider-Man 3 (film)

Discover and Discuss

• Search News for: Anti-Venom · Edward Allan Charles Brock · Edward Brock (Earth-616)
• Search Forums for: Anti-Venom · Edward Allan Charles Brock · Edward Brock (Earth-616)
• Discuss this and other characters on the forums

References