The first and most obvious character to have donned the Venom symbiote is of course Peter Parker. The character unwittingly took on the being while looking to repair his old red and blue costume on Battleworld, a distant planet where Earth's Mightiest Heroes and villains were transported to for the amusement of the Beyonder during Secret Wars - a comic oft considered to have been the first 'event' book in the superhero genre.
The black suit, as it would then be known, has taken on a unique reverence amongst the Spidey faithful, even though it debuted as a negative influence on the character to begin with.
Over time, Peter would actually manage to reconcile his differences with the symbiote, even reuniting with it in the pages of Amazing Spider-Man #800 to overcome the Red Goblin. It's actually a really interesting dynamic to examine, because even though Pete's time with the black suit is considered to have coincided with the character's darkest days, it ended in a triumphant coming together years later.
Also interesting to note is that, even after he parted with the symbiote, Pete wore a black suit anyway. With looks that good, who could blame him?
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.
