No longer one with the Venom symbiote, Gargan returns to his first costumed identity.
The moment I've been waiting for has finally arrived. Mac Gargan will become the Scorpion once again. Mac Gargan first appeared back in Amazing Spider-Man #19 as a private investigator hired by J. Jonah Jameson to follow Peter Parker. Jameson wanted to know how Parker managed to get so many shots of Spider-Man in action. Jameson soon pulled him off this assignment when he found out a scientist was conducting experiments and was able to create a serum that could make a human stronger than Spider-Man. Gargan jumped at the chance to make money. The problem was, the longer he had the serum in his system, the stronger he got and he also ran the risk of losing a sense of right and wrong.
Obviously Gargan refused to take an antidote to reverse the process. He killed the doctor and became part of Spider-Man's rogue gallery. Despite his new deadly abilities, Gargan seemed to be fated to constantly be defeated by Spider-Man. In Marvel Knights: Spider-Man #9, the Venom Symbiote suit joined with Gargan. Becoming Venom changed who he was. As Venom, Gargan was simply a replacement for Eddie Brock. His long standing vendetta against Jameson seemed forgotten. He had a little rise in power in becoming one of Osborn's Dark Avengers but still didn't do anything extraordinary. After the downfall of Norman Osborn, Gargan was incarcerated and had the symbiotic suit removed. Where did that leave Gargan? == TEASER == Now Mac Gargan is the Scorpion once again. This isn't a step back for him as Alistair Smythe has given him a cyborg upgrade. He now has a form of scorpion-sense (Smythe informed Gargan that scorpions can detect when creatures brush the hairs atop its pincers). He already had super strength and speed and now has an upgraded tail and claw. Will he finally be a match for Spider-Man?
The other nice thing about this current portrayal is Mac Gargan is shown to possess some intelligence. He was never close to being a genius but as a private investigator, he should have been able to come up with more of a plan when facing Spider-Man. Teaming up with Smythe and his other Spider-Slayers, Peter Parker's Big Time luck is about to end. There's also Jameson's luck that will be tested. As the current mayor of New York City, if it became public knowledge that he was responsible for the creation of the Scorpion and all the deaths at this hand, Jameson stands to lose everything.
If we're being honest, we know at the end of the day, Spider-Man will figure out how to outwit Scorpion, Smythe and the the slayers. What matters is that Gargan is the Scorpion once again. There never really was a need for him to become Venom. It might have given him a slight edge and made him a little more respected as a Spider-villain but he quickly fell into the typical "I want to eat your brains" mode. I'm all for characters evolving but it shouldn't be at the expense of who the character was at their core. Mac Gargan is the Scorpion. With his new suit and experiences he's had recently, let's see him climb the ladder in becoming one of Spider-Man's more serious and deadly villains.
Good, Scorpion was a good character to begin with, hope the next step is ending the Anti-Venom crap and just having Eddie be Venom again now that there is no other Venom for him to be anti to.
I thought Warren Ellis did a perfectly good job redefining the character as Venom. He did more than just have him eat people, he had the symbiote assert itself more (which we didn't really see with Brock), but he also had Gargan's weird addiction to the power, even though it was turning him into something he didn't want to be.
Definition: This term has become more and more used in the world of comic books. A retcon is when a later writer changes the history of a comic book to accommodate their own storyline. The more comic books continue, especially in the case of Marvel and DC, the more history current writers have to wade through. Many feel that it is easier to change the continuity than to have to deal with it.
Gargan becoming the Scorpion again is NOT a retcon. Slott did not mess with his history. He came up with a completely logical way to return him as the Scorpion character. He didn't ONE MORE DAY him or have Superboy Prime punch the walls of reality to do it.
As much as I love classics, I also love changes :) (hey, the classics are still there, nobody prevents you from reading them again!) His recent venom era was pretty neat. Back to Scorpion... I'm kinda sad about that..but hey, shaking thigns up and the status quo are what comics are all about!
I'm really liking his new Scorpion look here! Neat!
Bout EFFING time he went back to being Scorpion. I never liked him as Venom, and I agree you would think for someone who was a P.I. he would have sooome brains.
I was just thinking why they made Scorpion the new Venom, back then Scorpion was like Spider-Man's evil twin, he was a genetically altered man with arachnid traits. Only he was stronger, and faster and more powerful. Then Venom came along and became the new evil clone. So they took one clone and added it to another.
Awsome, i relay think he was already a bit of a match for spidy, but with Scorpian scense, a new nad improoved robtic tail, pincers, and increased strenagth i think he should be more powerful then spidy (well he was alraedy stronger in his classic incarnation but he has more advantages now and another strneaght increase).
" ..saying Gargan didn't do anything as Venom is crazy. This cat obviously hasn't read his Thunderbolts. The relationship between him and the symbiote did a lot for his character's development. niggas know. "
" @InnerVenom123: Pick up Faith in Monsters and Caged Angels, and get back to me. In case you were including those; To me, it came across like Gargan was finally becoming a smarter criminal, and the symbiote started out as something that was helping him, but ended up being way too much too handle. "
This is proof you didn't even bother to read my reply. I referenced an instance from Caged Angels, which was Gargan's big moment.
And no, he didn't show any instances of intelligence... just being upset that he has a new fetish for eating people. And then the symbiote tells him to get over it and eat people.
And he does. For like, three years of comics following.
@InnerVenom123: Pick up Faith in Monsters and Caged Angels, and get back to me. In case you were including those; To me, it came across like Gargan was finally becoming a smarter criminal, and the symbiote started out as something that was helping him, but ended up being way too much too handle.
" @InnerVenom123: Well, yeah..and it fuckin rocked. The psychichs attacking the mountain in Caged Angels did a lot for the character,
The art rocked. Storywise, the only good part concerning Mac was where the symbiote literally told him to stop being such a whiny little girl. There was no character development for Mac, just the symbiote - in that now it has become abusive to the host. . . oh, wait, "The Hunger" already established that. So all of Mac's appearances in that arc were nothing more but excuses for Deodato to draw some good monster art.
@Disco_Destroyer said:
" @InnerVenom123: and dont forget Whirlwind, Tigershark, Boomerang and Hyde trying to get him to blackmail Osborn. The way he dealt with that was really well done..and yes..he ended up eating people :). "
Norman Osborn had better showings in that comic. The most impressive thing Mac did was.... oh, right, NOTHING. The symbiote was more entertaining. "Hrrrr.... date."
@Disco_Destroyer said:
" @InnerVenom123: have you read the damn thing? "
I've read Thunderbolts through Dark Avengers, even the Marvel Knights and yes, some of "Beyond!", even Sinister Spider-man. I am well versed on Mac-Venom.
I mean, have you seen my username? I just read Mac's appearances for the sake of seeing what the symbiote was up to.
Well, yeah..and it fuckin rocked. The psychichs attacking the mountain in Caged Angels did a lot for the character, and dont forget Whirlwind, Tigershark, Boomerang and Hyde trying to get him to blackmail Osborn. The way he dealt with that was really well done..and yes..he ended up eating people :).
" ..saying Gargan didn't do anything as Venom is crazy. This cat obviously hasn't read his Thunderbolts. The relationship between him and the symbiote did a lot for his character's development. niggas know. "
..saying Gargan didn't do anything as Venom is crazy. This cat obviously hasn't read his Thunderbolts. The relationship between him and the symbiote did a lot for his character's development.
" Well he finally has pincers from the look of it, so he finally looks the part. Glad to see him back in green. "
Yeah,.. Mac Gargan as Venom?.....nah,....
I didn't even KNOW who scorpion was at first, of course you couldn't miss Venom, or Doc Oc (not from the movies but these guys are authentic villains) I would think he's one of the first villains that didn't really offer a challenge, common thug (as it was with Rhino or even the Sandman? except Sandman can't be TOUCHED, which i thought was a challenge) enhanced by a suit. However,... i feel that Scorpion is to Parker what Sabretooth is to Wolverine.
I'm a big Scorpion fan but I'm not big fan of constant armor upgrades. He's already stronger than Spider-Man with all of the same abilities save for the Spider-Sense and web-fluid. It seems to me that Marvel has tried to make him more appealing to readers and fans of Spider-Man, over the years, by giving him ridiculous armor to wear. (Don't get me wrong, I like this new look, but it undermines the potential of the character.) He doesn't need anything more than the abilities that he was first given. He was Spider-Man's counterpart with an extra appendage that comes out of his ass . . . he needs nothing more.
For me, before there was Venom, there was Scorpion, a character to bring pinnacle physical challenge to Spider-Man creating a classic battle. He's a character that has been treated with little respect and now he's running with the Spider-Man equivalent of the Revers because no one thinks that he can take on the Spider alone!
Scorpion is to Spider-Man in the same way as Sabretooth is to Wolverine, as The Thing is to the Hulk, as Ultraman is to Superman, he is a character that should inspire stories of colossal combat, not constantly dressing for failure.
I'm not just interested in the Gargan taking on the Scorpion mantle again and he future rematch with Parker (and hopefully his new costume), but also this whole thing about there being a new Venom coming too. I'm not just interested in what goes down between him and Pete, I wanna know if they will be smart enough to use Gargan and Brock as a way to build up the new Venom and Carnage as a sort of a Hunt for the Symbiote story line. Come on imagine Pete stuck in a three way deathmatch between the new Scorpion, the new Venom, and Anit-Venom(or whateva Brock is calling himself now).
Now I am interested in the Spider-Man comic books again. Mac Gargan as Scorpion is indeed good news. The story sounds good with Jameson as Mayor, and Scorpion running around, yes, there could potentially be some consequences for JJ's actions if it gets revealed as you say G-Man. Sounds promising and finally exciting again!
Does it seem to anyone else that Marvel isn't creative, anymore? It seems to have a DC mindset of making a drastic change and change it back in 6 months. From Spider-man, Captain America, to Wolverine, it's getting pointless to try to keep up. AofA was great, but it brought on even more alternate reality additions.
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