Warning: Spoilers for Death of the Venomverse (2023) #5 ahead!After hopping from universe to universe, absorbing symbiotes and supers alike to steal their strength, Carnage’s trans-dimensional rampage has finally come to an end. Coming face to face with an incarnation of Knull the King in Black, Carnage pits all his strength against Knull’s might…and wins.
Cullen Bunn, Gerardo Sandoval, Victor Olazaba, and Jim Campbell’s Death of the Venomverse (2023) #5 concludes the Death of the Venomverse series. Team Venom (the assembled Venoms from across the multiverse) stage one last attempt to stop Carnage, arriving in a new multiverse just after Carnage has slaughtered that world’s Avengers and attacked Knull. Although Team Venom does their best to teleport Knull away from Carnage, Knull fights back – and Carnage uses the distraction to stab Knull through the back.
Although a new wave of Venoms arrive to try and subdue Carnage, the battle is lost; with the consumption of Knull, Carnage’s transformation into a godlike entity is complete. In despair, Agent Venom teleports all the Venoms home to await whatever end is in store.
Carnage Wins
This is a landmark moment in Carnage’s history and the culmination of the past two years of Carnage storytelling. This arc of Carnage began in Philip K. Johnson, Ram V, Ty Templeton, Kendrick Lim, and Edgar Salazar’s Carnage Forever (2022) and Ram V, Kendrick Lim, and Frencesco Manna’s Carnage (2022), with Carnage hunting down people with specific powers to absorb across the universe and the creation of his new weapon, the godkilling All-Blood spear. Simultaneously, the events of Ryan North, Leonardo Romero, Mirka Andolfo, Paulo Siquera, and Nico Leon’s Extreme Venomverse (2023) was a featured part of 2023’s “Summer of Symbiotes” event. The miniseries detailed various Venoms throughout the multiverse being recruited into a strike force to try and halt Carnage’s plans.
By defeating Knull and absorbing his powers, Carnage’s victory is complete. It is rare for villains to win outright like this, especially with a marquee event (the Summer of Symbiote) being dedicated to building up his opposition; in a shocking twist, many beloved versions of Venom have simply been killed outright or left for dead. Carnage has achieved everything he has set out to do, and the heroes have been unable to thwart him even a single time.
Carnage now possesses power enough to rival Eddie Brock (the current King in Black) for supreme power over the symbiote species; should he win, he would become one of the most powerful entities the Marvel Universe has ever seen. With godlike powers, deadly weapons, and no apparent weaknesses, Carnage has done what few other Marvel villains have managed: he’s won.
Death of the Venomverse (2023) #5 is now available from Marvel Comics.
