12 Greatest Marvel’s Venom Villains (Ranked)

12 Greatest Marvel's Venom Villains Ranked

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Venom is one of the most intriguing characters in Marvel’s roster. The Venom Symbiote debuted with Spider-Man’s famous ‘Black Suit’, but he really became famous when he bonded with Eddie Brock. Initially a villain, Venom would evolve into an antihero and one of Marvel’s most complex and beloved characters. There have been plenty of Venom’s villains, most of which have been Symbiotes like himself. Among them, Carnage is absolutely the most famous one, but there have been others as well, and some of them haven’t been Symbiotes. This article is going to give you a list of the 12 greatest villains faced by Venom in comic books.

List of Greatest Venom Villains

12. Agony

Debut: Venom: Lethal Protector #4 (May 1993)
Full Name: Leslie Gesneria

Leslie Gesneria was the host of one of the six symbiote “children” of Venom. This symbiote is predominantly purple in color and was called Agony. Leslie Gesneria worked for Life Foundation which sought to provide a comfortable underground life for their wealthy clients after the impending nuclear holocaust.

She was chosen as a host for the Venom spawns created by force. She is defeated by Venom and Spider-Man in the Venom: Lethal Protector storyline. In the Venom: Separation Anxiety miniseries, the symbiote is revealed to have survived.

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Leslie mentions that she had wanted to be a heroine, but like the other hosts of the Life Foundation, she was having difficulty controlling her symbiote.

Leslie and the others fought with Eddie Brock, Venom’s secret identity, released from prison and kidnapped him to teach them how to control their symbiotes. Leslie shows remorse and regrets her actions, just before she is murdered by her “sister” Scream, using a sonic knife.

After Leslie is killed, what remains of his symbiote merges with his brothers (except Carnage and Toxin) and forces a man named Scott Washington to host his merged symbiotes called: Hybrid.

11. Phage

Debut: Venom: Lethal Protector #4 (May 1993)
Full Name: Carl Mach

Carl Mach was a mercenary who worked for Life Foundation. A remnant from the Cold War and sought to provide a comfortable life for their wealthy clients after the impending nuclear holocaust. The foundation has to experience life with the Venom symbiote in the hopes of developing superhuman peacekeeping.

Carl is one of five men and women who are chosen as hosts for the forcibly created Venom spawns. In the Venom: Lethal Protector storyline, Phage, and his siblings are defeated by Venom and Spider-Man. Later, they fight with Eddie Brock, who has been released from prison, and kidnap him in a last-ditch effort to communicate with their strange “others”.

In #4, Scream kills Phage with a sonic knife, deeming the Symbiotes and any host between them to be evil. The Phage symbiote survives, and he is imprisoned and experienced on La Chapelle in conjunction with his siblings.

10. Riot

Debut: Venom: Lethal Protector #4 (May 1993)
Full Name: Trevor Cole

Trevor Cole was one of the mercenaries hired by Life Foundation, which was preparing for the Cold War and sought to provide a comfortable underground life for their wealthy clients after the impending nuclear holocaust.

Trevor was one of five men and women who were chosen as hosts for the forcibly created Venom spawns. He is defeated by Venom and Spider-Man in the Venom: Lethal Protector storyline and was presumed dead in the story. The symbiote survived, though, and reappeared in the Venom: Separation Anxiety miniseries. His lack of control over the symbiote bound to him made him violent.

Trevor and the other hosts set off in search of Venom in order to kidnap him, to ask him how to control their symbiotes. Riot shows remorse and regrets his actions, just before he is murdered by his “sister” Scream, using a sonic knife.

9. Lee Price

Debut: Venom #1 (January 2017)
Full Name: Lee Price

After parting ways with Flash Thompson by unspecified means, the Venom symbiote occurs in a black market deal between the Black Cat gang and the Tombstone gang. He resorts to teaming up with one of the men present, a ranger trooper named Lee Price, who was with Scorpion as part of the Black Cat gang.

The weakened symbiote advocates for Price, trying to convince him to become a hero like Thompson. Price ignores and overpowers him, intending to use him for personal gain as a totally evil new Venom. After having to stop the Venom symbiote from attacking Black Cat, Lee Price bids farewell to Black Cat’s lair while Scorpion is suspicious of Lee.

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8. Sin-Eater

Debut: Peter Parker, The Spectacular Spider-Man #107 (October 1985)
Full Name: Stanley Carter

Stanley Carter an agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. working in research and development. He was injected with experimental drugs to increase strength and endurance. Carter turned violent and resigned from S.H.I.E.L.D., eventually becoming a detective with the New York City Police Department.

After his partner was killed by several young criminals, he became obsessed with killing anyone who “sinned” by abusing authority. After becoming Sin-Eater, his first victim was Captain Jean DeWolff.

The public revelation of the identity of the Sin-Eater as Stanley Carter by Peter Parker was responsible for the undoing of Eddie Brock’s journalistic career, as Brock had published a series of articles about the Sin-Eater in The Daily Globe, based on his interviews. with another man claiming to be the Sin-Eater, Mr. Emil Gregg (“a compulsive confessor”).

This led to Brock’s hatred of Peter and eventually his bonding with the alien symbiote Venom.

7. Jack O’ Lantern 

Debut: Venom #1 (2011)
Full Name: Unknown

After the fall of Osborn, a new Jack O’Lantern appears working for the third Crime Master. As a child, the boy who would become Jack O’Lantern had disobeyed his parents and mistreated animals. While playing Jack O’Lantern for Halloween, he came across a house that the Crime Master was in.

Crime Master took the boy under his wing and trained him to be a murderer. It was with this training that Jack O’Lantern killed his parents. One of his jobs puts him in conflict with Agent Venom.

6. The Jury

Debut: Venom: Lethal Protector #2 (March 1993)
Full Name: None

The Jury is a group of supervillains from the Marvel Comics universe. After his son Hugh was killed by Venom in an escape attempt, General Orwell Taylor funded the creation of the Jury and the equipment used.

He assembled Hugh’s friends, Curtis Elkins and Samuel Caulkin, his own youngest son, Maxwell Taylor, and two Vault Guards, whom he outfitted with armor based on blueprints from the Guardian designed by Tony Stark.

Their first mission to take down Venom failed. They then captured Spider-Man, whom they judged for his responsibility in the birth of the supervillain driven mad by his old black symbiotic suit. The trial was actually meant to plunge Peter Parker into the throes of guilt, so that he would help the Jury kill Venom.

5. Shriek

Debut: Spider-Man Unlimited #1 (May 1993)
Full Name: Frances Louise Barrison

Shriek is a dangerous and criminally insane villain with the ability to manipulate sound. She once allied herself with Carnage and several other supervillains who were going to New York to kill.

Shriek’s origins are uncertain. She was called Sandra Deel in her early appearances but was called Frances Louise Barrison in later appearances. According to the Spider-Man Encyclopedia she was born Frances Louise Barrison, but she uses the name Sandra Deel as an alias.

During her childhood, she was abused by her mother for being overweight, driving her to drugs and leading her to later become a mother. She became a drug dealer, exposing her to situations that ultimately damaged her sanity, namely being shot in the head by a police officer, and being put into Cloak’s dark dimension, which gave Shriek her abilities.

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4. Scream

Debut: Venom: Lethal Protector #4 (May 1993)
Full Name: Donna Diego

The Scream symbiote was one of five symbiotes that were forcibly generated from the original Venom symbiote and was its unofficial leader from California.

Like the other four hosts, Donna Diego volunteered for the Life Foundation, a survival group within the American government preparing for the mutual destruction of the Cold War and to provide a comfortable life for its wealthy clients after the impending nuclear holocaust.

Carlton Drake was experimenting with symbiotes in hopes of creating so-called “super policemen” to guard the imaginary utopia of the shelter, and Donna was chosen from the security force made up of policemen, soldiers, and mercenaries.

During Scream’s first public appearance, she encountered Spider-Man while he was terrorizing at a mall near Salinas, California.

3. Toxin

Debut: Venom/Carnage #2 (October 2004)
Full Name: Patrick Mulligan

Like his “father” Venom, Carnage produced an offspring: a third symbiote, who would become Toxin. Carnage only felt disgust and hatred towards his new spawn, even before he “gave birth”, both fearing that it might be much stronger than himself, and generally disgusted with the idea of giving birth (reflecting the attitudes of the Carnage’s host, Cletus Kasady).

At the same time, Carnage’s rival and “father” Venom realized that Carnage was “pregnant” and sought out Carnage to discuss this new symbiote. Carnage had resolved to kill his spawn as soon as he was born.

Venom was doing his best to protect the new symbiote, intending to raise it to become his new mate. Venom was also concerned that, like the 1000th symbiote in his line, the new symbiote could become psychotic and violent due to genetic breakdown.

2. Knull 

Debut: Venom #3 (August 2018)
Full Name: Knull

Knull is a fictional supervillain appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics, commonly in association with Venom and Carnage. The character is depicted as an evil deity, who created the weapon known as All-Black the Necrosword and the alien races known as Klyntar and Exolons.

The character would go on to play a larger role in the Marvel Universe. Knull is a primordial deity who was born after the destruction of the sixth iteration of the cosmos and was originally content to wander the endless void until the Celestials arrived and began creating the seventh iteration of the Marvel Universe.

Awakened by the “Light of Creation” and outraged by the plunder of his kingdom of darkness, Knull retaliated by creating All-Black the Necrosword and killing one of the Celestials.

1. Carnage

Debut: The Amazing Spider-Man #359 (February 1992)
Full Name: Cletus Kassaday

Carnage is a supervillain generally depicted as an enemy of Venom and Spider-Man. Carnage belongs to a race of amorphous extraterrestrial parasites known as the Symbiotes that form a symbiosis in bonding with their hosts and giving them superhuman abilities.

The Carnage symbiote is generally depicted as a descendant of Venom who is more powerful than him due to the nature of symbiotes and is much more sociopathic and sadistic.

Like Venom, Carnage has had multiple hosts over the years, but the most infamous remains the first, the serial killer, Cletus Kasady, whose personality perfectly matches that of the symbiote. Other hosts include Ben Reilly, Karl Malus, and Norman Osborn (who became the Red Goblin while hosting the Carnage symbiote).

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