Those who know me are aware that around the age of 13-14 I started reading comic books. I was a die-hard fan of the Marvel comics company, and would only very rarely even try comics from other companies. Let it also be said that I still enjoy reading comics, but in the last maybe 10 years Marvel's writing staff have turned the "Marvel Universe" into an uncountable number of alternate realities that don't tie together at all even from one issue of a particular title to the next!
Because of that, I have found much better reading from newer, up-n-coming comic companies. I haven't read an enjoyable Marvel comic in a few years...until a few days ago. I got my hands on a 5-part series from 2010 titled simply: Carnage.
So, a quick breakdown of history. Years ago Spider-Man got a black costume which turned out to be an alien symbiote which bonded with Spider-Man, making him stronger but turning him violent. He forced the alien to leave him, so it hated him, and bonded with another guy who hated Spider-Man equally. Together the guy (Eddie Brock) and the alien became Venom, who is like Spider-Man's archnemesis. A piece of the alien got separated from the rest, and bonded with a serial killer, and Carnage was born. Like Venom, but meaner, faster, deadlier. Shortly after one of the recent Marvel Comics multi-part story arcs like Civil War or whichever one, Carnage was taken into orbit and suffocated.
The idea behind the 2010 Carnage series is that a scientist trying to compete with Tony Stark (Iron Man) uses a communication satellite to knock the Carnage corpse out of orbit, and then uses the alien DNA to make his own semi-organic armor which he hopes will be better than Iron Man's. I won't say what happens, cuz if you have the means I highly recommend giving it a read.
On the technical details side, the books feature Spider-Man and Iron Man as the main protagonists. They use the new "blurry painted looking" art style of many modern Marvel titles, which I normally can't stand, but this series is dark in both color and content (rated T+ for teens due to violence). The art actually enhances the story. A truly well-put together series that actually has plot coherence all the way through! Kudos to Marvel for a change!
