The secret of Marvel’s Zombiote horde has finally been revealed, and it is just as bad as it seems.

As numerous battles are being waged across just as many fronts elsewhere in the pages of Venom War #2, Liz Allan is busy confronting the enigmatic Mr. Meridius within the boardroom at Alchemax headquarters. While Liz is intimately familiar with the kind of threat that Meridius’ K-chemicals pose, she’s only just now learning of how far that particular threat has come. As it turns out, Meridius’ secret compound is itself responsible for the cannibalistic Zombiotes that are quickly washing over New York City, and there’s no telling how she’s ever going to put a stop to it alone.

Written by AL EWING Art by IBAN COELLO Colors by FRANK D’ARMATA Letters by VC’s ARIANA MAHER Design by STACIE ZUCKER Main cover art by IBAN COELLO & FRANK D’ARMATA Variant covers by IBAN COELLO, SKOTTIE YOUNG, PEACH MOMOKO, LUCIANO VECCHIO, CHRIS GIARRUSSO, and CLAYTON CRAIN

Although Marvel’s Zombiotes are a new breed of threat unto themselves, they’re far from the first of their ilk in concept. In 2008, the Marvel Universe ground to a temporary halt when satellites controlled by Doctor Doom “accidentally” unleashed an infectious swarm of Venom symbiotes on New York City in the pages of Mighty Avengers #7 by Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Bagley. This Venom Virus swarmed not just civilians, but heroes and villains alike, up until Tony Stark developed and antidote capable of both culling the spread of the infection and burning it out of those who were afflicted.

Ten years later, the Venom-themed crossover eventVenomized #1 by Cullen Bunn and Iban Coello introduced the Marvel Universe to yet another infectious strain of symbiotes in the form of the Poisons. These crystalline alien entities are not only symbiotic parasites themselves, they subsist by consuming other symbiotes—particularly Venoms. When a variant of Doctor Strange called upon other heroes and villains who were bonded to their own Venom symbiotes for help, it kicked off a Multiversal war that nearly ended in the total annihilation of one of Marvel’s most iconic characters.

Apart from their symbiote origins, the Zombiotes of Venom War are also the latest in a long line of undead cannibals to grace the Marvel Universe in the years since the debut of the original Marvel Zombiesback in 2005’s Ultimate Fantastic Four #21 by Mark Millar and Greg Land. The issue saw the Ultimate Reed Richards make contact with another version of himself from across the Multiverse who he quickly made the journey to meet in the flesh. Unfortunately for him, this variant was from a world that had fallen to a zombie plague, and who was intent on spreading it as far as possible.

Venom War #2 is on sale now from Marvel Comics.

Source: Marvel Comics