For years, Eddie Brock and Carnage have clashed, most commonly, as Venom and as Carnage, their names when they are combined with their respective symbiotes – the Carnage symbiote was actually spawned FROM the Venom symiote), but in the recent crossover event, Symbiosis Necrosis, their latest epic confrontation was no longer a one-on-one.

You see, in Venom #32 (by Al Ewing, Ken Lashley, Romulo Fajardo Jr. and Clayon Cowles), when Carnage came into contact with the Venom symbiote, he gained Venom’s recent ability to travel through time and space in the symbiote’s lifetime, including Meridius’ ethereal Garden. Carnage took advantage of that to travel to the Garden of Time, but he wasn’t met just by Eddie Brock, but by every King in Black still standing.

What did Carnage first do to the current Venom, Dylan Brock?

Venom #32 opened with the horrifying sight of Dylan Brock strung up by his own Venom symbiote as the latest in Carnage’s long line of victims. As the child of Eddie and Anne Weying, Dylan was always connected to Marvel’s symbiotes by associating, yet he is inextricably tied to them as the child of Venom. This unique parentage is due to Anne’s bond with the Venom symbiote and her place as part of the greater symbiote Hive, which caused Dylan to be conceived in part via her Codex, the psychological profile and consciousness all hosts leave behind after bonding to a symbiote.

However, there was more to Carnage’s plan than just, you know, carnage. Carnage’s plan was not necessarily to kill Dylan (who Carnage fought against for the first time in this crossover), but he wanted to torment Eddie and the Venom symbiote, so Carnage had a devious plan in mind to mess with the mind of the Venom symbiote, and also plant a seed of distrust between Dylan and the symbiote by showing Dylan all the bad things that Venom has done over the years (which has currently led the Venom symbiote to split from Eddie because it was so ashamed of its past). Dylan also got a glimpse of what Venom WILL do, and that has left him mystified.

At the same time, though, of course, Carnage also DID stab Dylan through the heart. Forcing the Venom symbiote to restore his life by rebuilding Dylan’s heart, but the symbiote knows that it might have done so too late, that while it was able to restore Dylan’s body, it was too late to save his SOUL, and what does that mean for the future of Dylan Brock as Venom? That is a concept that will come up during the upcoming Venom War, where Dylan and Eddie fight for control of Venom. Before we got to that point, though, Eddie still had to take on Carnage.

How does Carnage’s journey tie into the King in Black?

The mantle of King in Black originally belonged to Knull, the ancient, evil progenitor of all symbiotes. Following Knull’s defeat and subsequent destruction at the hands of Eddie Brock, the latter stepped into the role, taking on a host of new responsibilities to match his near-limitless new powers. Since then, Eddie has uncovered a multitude of future versions of himself, each of whom stands as a King in Black in their own right despite all having distinct personalities and proclivities.

Even before Eddie assumed his role as King in Black and discovered he had ascended to become a new form of human-symbiote hybrid, he and the Venom symbiote had parted ways. While the former continued in his quest to uncover the truth behind his villainous future self, Meridius, the Venom symbiote bonded to the young Dylan Brock.

While Eddie and his family have undergone more than their fair share of drastic shifts, Carnage and Cletus Kasady each embarked on their own respective quest for divinity. In Carnage’s case, this meant aspiring to become the next great God Butcher, whereas Cletus returned to his roots as a serial killer. In recent months, the pair’s latest encounter led to a disturbing merger, as the Carnage symbiote quite literally consumed Cletus’ brain, reclaiming the serial killer’s psyche as part of itself.

During Carnage’s fight with the Kings in Black, the Garden of Time was destroyed, sending the various versions of Eddie displaced through time. However, when Carnage came to the Garden of Time, it taunted Venom with something it saw through Meridius, which is that Dylan and Venom are apparently destined to turn the world into one big version of Venom, with the symbiote bonding with the entire planet! This has freaked Eddie out, and is causing him to want to make sure that Dylan is no longer bonded to Venom. Dylan, though, has seen his OWN glimpse of the future, and he has a different take on things.

Therefore, father and son both legitimately believe that their way is the only way to save the world, and as a result, their upcoming Venom War will be a very difficult one for both of them (and the rest of the world in the wake of their battle, of course).