10 Comic Book Weapons That Broke All The Rules

9. All-Black The Necrosword

All-Black Necrosword Galactus
Marvel Comics

This might be a slight cheat, given the symbiotes - or Klyntar - are an alien species in and of themselves, but there's no denying that, through recent retcons, All-Black the Necrosword has changed the landscape of the Marvel universe.

To begin with, All-Black was just the weapon of Gorr the God Butcher, a character introduced at the beginning of what would become a character defining stint on Mighty Thor from writer Jason Aaron and artist Esad Ribic. I say "just" - Gorr was an incredibly unique character who had a bone to pick with all the gods of Asgard, and All-Black was right at the centre of his quest for revenge.

What would take All-Black from being just another cool weapon to feature in the tales of Asgard to truly next-level territory, though, was Donny Cates and Ryan Stegman's run on Venom.

Cates and Stegman's work on Venom built upon Brian Bendis and Valerio Schiti's treatment of the symbiotes in their underrated Guardians of the Galaxy run, which retconned them from being inherently evil alien creatures into the exact opposite. Venom also eventually revealed that All-Black was really the first ever symbiote, created by the dark god Knull when he slayed one of the first ever Celestials during the universe's inception.

That one change has flipped the history of the symbiotes completely on its head, and the Marvel universe is all the better for it.

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WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.