How much power can venom give a person? I mean, how high is Bane's strength level at its peak? How strong can venom make a normal person for that matter? He's tough, but obviously not Superman tough, so what are the limits for what venom can do for someone?

Also, why hasn't bane, or anyone else, tried making money off of Venom? Is Bane the only one who can produce it? And if so, does he keep the secret formula for himself so no one can use it against him or is there some other reason? I just figure that with venom one could build their own super powered army or become a major drug lord in the DC universe.

Answer #1)http://www.comicvine.com/bane/29-6129/bane-before-the-venom/92-630173/

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Venom doesn't increase a user's strength much more than regular steroids. When Batman was on venom, he could barely lift a refrigerator (not saying that that wouldn't be impressive in the real world, but in the context of the DC Universe, it's very small potatoes on the scale of superhuman strength). Right after Bane kicked his addiction to the drug, he and Batman ended up in a fight with a gang of venom using thugs and wiped the floor with the lot of them pretty easily. And in a storyarc not much later, Bane injected his former henchman Bird with an improved venom formula, and beat him up with incredible ease. Long story short: venom doesn't make it's users too much stronger than they already are.

Answer #2) Very few people know the formula to venom. Bane does happen to be one of them, and he tried marketing it, but it backfired on him. Because this took place not long after he beat his addiction to it, and his relationship with the drug was already pretty cautious at that point, his failed attempts to sell it just exasperated his negative feelings towards venom. He viewed it as the reason for his original downfall (which it was, since venom's entire purpose in Knightfall was to be Bane's achilles heal) and then began an ongoing mission to rid the world of the drug wherever he could find it (look to his story with Hourman in JSA: Classified). Gail Simone had a somewhat contradictory view of Bane's opinion on venom, where he kept a few small vials in his belt out of habit, although he would rather die than use it, unless it was to save Scandal Savage (or he was manipulating his teammates). There are a number of different ways of looking at that in the pages of Secret Six when comparing it to the way his personality had been previously established in other books.

@Megapants: Ah, so basically TV and movies have exaggerated the effectiveness of venom in order to make Bane appear more powerful and menacing. The comic book Venom doesn't really give a person true super strength, just peak human strength, enough to give you an edge over a normal person but not enough to make you a one man army, i.e. a petty thug hopped up on venom won't instantly become Bane 2.0 & be able to bust through prison walls and take on the entire Gotham City police force & stuff like that.

But, if thats the case, then how did he defeat Killer Croc? I thought Croc did actually possess super strength, enough to bust through steel and concrete and rip normal people apart even if he's not in the same weight class as guys like Superman or Martian Manhunter. I was under the impression that Bane defeated Croc using venom to boost his power to when he was simply able to overwhelm him completely (did he really just use skill to beat a far stronger opponent like Batman does?). It also kinda makes his venom delivery system, the tubes, appear a bit impractical if venom isn't really this unstable, monstrously strength enhancing super drug that needs to be carefully regulated to control how much of a boost it gives him...Wouldn't a pill, drink, or injection be simpler? It still looks cool of course, just seems unnecessary.

At any rate, this news makes Bane's defeat of Batman somewhat more impressive cuz his victory was more about real warrior skill & training than unbeatable super strength, though on the other hand it limits his ability to be a bigger player in the super villain community outside of Gotham (which has few super powered villains and more scheming psychopaths and crimelords).

@Sinestro2828 said:

@Megapants: Ah, so basically TV and movies have exaggerated the effectiveness of venom in order to make Bane appear more powerful and menacing. The comic book Venom doesn't really give a person true super strength, just peak human strength, enough to give you an edge over a normal person but not enough to make you a one man army, i.e. a petty thug hopped up on venom won't instantly become Bane 2.0 & be able to bust through prison walls and take on the entire Gotham City police force & stuff like that.

But, if thats the case, then how did he defeat Killer Croc? I thought Croc did actually possess super strength, enough to bust through steel and concrete and rip normal people apart even if he's not in the same weight class as guys like Superman or Martian Manhunter. I was under the impression that Bane defeated Croc using venom to boost his power to when he was simply able to overwhelm him completely (did he really just use skill to beat a far stronger opponent like Batman does?). It also kinda makes his venom delivery system, the tubes, appear a bit impractical if venom isn't really this unstable, monstrously strength enhancing super drug that needs to be carefully regulated to control how much of a boost it gives him...Wouldn't a pill, drink, or injection be simpler? It still looks cool of course, just seems unnecessary.

At any rate, this news makes Bane's defeat of Batman somewhat more impressive cuz his victory was more about real warrior skill & training than unbeatable super strength, though on the other hand it limits his ability to be a bigger player in the super villain community outside of Gotham (which has few super powered villains and more scheming psychopaths and crimelords).

Before recent years, Killer Croc was just a really tough guy with a skin condition/hardening that looked like a reptile's scale. That was the case when Bane beat him (look at Croc's appearances in the 90's animated series for what I'm talking about). Croc has always been tougher than most normal humans could ever hope to be, but he didn't have superhuman strength until, approximately the last decade or so when I think writers wanted to make him more badass (mostly starting with the changes made to him in the Hush storyline), although that's a conversation for another time.

Regardless, when Bane originally fought Killer Croc, he beat him easily. When they had their rematch, Croc was smart enough to smash Bane's wrist control at the very start of the fight, but even without venom Bane was trading punches pretty evenly with Croc.

As for Bane's original fight with Batman, if you really step back and look at the story, Bane would have beaten Batman even without venom. Bruce was simply waaay too tired to put up a decent fight against anyone, especially someone with good fighting skills like Bane. Superhuman strength had nothing to do with how their fight unfolded, and the drug itself only came up as an actual important plotpoint when Jean Paul Valley made him overdose on it, and then cut him off from his supply and put him in sudden withdrawal.

And I don't think the lesser power of the comic book version of venom, nor the fact that he quit it back in 1995, limits Bane's potential. After all, it wasn't the venom that allowed him to rise to the top of Gotham's mobs in Knightfall. In fact, without a mind full of chemicals screwing with his brain (the most powerful weapon he has), he's far deadlier than he was when he was using the drug, and his ambitions aren't limited to just Gotham City. The same could be said about Ra's Al Ghul, his ultimate goals, and his lack of actual powers. Both Bane and Ra's are international terrorists that are more concentrated on scheming and undermining their potential enemies, which is probably why those two guys got along so well in the Bane of the Demon storyline (which I would recommend even more than Knightfall if you're really interested in Bane's character and how he operates).

@Sinestro2828 said:

How much power can venom give a person? I mean, how high is Bane's strength level at its peak? How strong can venom make a normal person for that matter? He's tough, but obviously not Superman tough, so what are the limits for what venom can do for someone?

Also, why hasn't bane, or anyone else, tried making money off of Venom? Is Bane the only one who can produce it? And if so, does he keep the secret formula for himself so no one can use it against him or is there some other reason? I just figure that with venom one could build their own super powered army or become a major drug lord in the DC universe.

There is no consistency when it comes to venom or lazarus pits or Hugo Strange's monster serum,every writer who touched these chemicals gave his/her own take.The abilities,sideeffects etc vary between these writers.For obvious reasons i won't dwell on it much.

But i'll assume roughly that a normal healthy male can lift 1000lbs on a good dose of venom,an already near meta/peak physical specimen like Bane can life 2-3 tons on a full dose and near 1 ton without it.

Bane HATES venom or did prior to recent events in Secret Six,he destroyed the venom biz in Gotham(Vengeance of Bane #2) and also in Santa Prisca(JSA Classified).However during the Infinite Crisis period hack writers decided to have Bane start using venom for no reason,they ignored all his character development.Thankfully he was mostly a background character during these stories and Gail Simone ignored all that crap in Secret Six,Bane was'nt the only one who's character was changed/personality was altered.Talia and Deathstroke come to mind.But in Azrael Bane did try to market venom to a Santa Priscan general but that was all a part of his plan to control Santa Prisca,he also openly sold it in Superman/Batman in addition to using it himself but Superman/Batman is a dumb series full of inconsistentcies on every level.

Bane knows the formula so does Lex Luthor,Scarecrow/Hush(they both made it while working together),2 deceased doctors(the former invented it,the latter was the Hugo Strange lookalike who performed surgery on Bane),Zombie(Bane's henchman whose status is unknown).Possibly Doctor Hurt and maybe The Dealer.

@Sinestro2828 said:

@Megapants: Ah, so basically TV and movies have exaggerated the effectiveness of venom in order to make Bane appear more powerful and menacing. The comic book Venom doesn't really give a person true super strength, just peak human strength, enough to give you an edge over a normal person but not enough to make you a one man army, i.e. a petty thug hopped up on venom won't instantly become Bane 2.0 & be able to bust through prison walls and take on the entire Gotham City police force & stuff like that.

But, if thats the case, then how did he defeat Killer Croc? I thought Croc did actually possess super strength, enough to bust through steel and concrete and rip normal people apart even if he's not in the same weight class as guys like Superman or Martian Manhunter. I was under the impression that Bane defeated Croc using venom to boost his power to when he was simply able to overwhelm him completely (did he really just use skill to beat a far stronger opponent like Batman does?). It also kinda makes his venom delivery system, the tubes, appear a bit impractical if venom isn't really this unstable, monstrously strength enhancing super drug that needs to be carefully regulated to control how much of a boost it gives him...Wouldn't a pill, drink, or injection be simpler? It still looks cool of course, just seems unnecessary.

At any rate, this news makes Bane's defeat of Batman somewhat more impressive cuz his victory was more about real warrior skill & training than unbeatable super strength, though on the other hand it limits his ability to be a bigger player in the super villain community outside of Gotham (which has few super powered villains and more scheming psychopaths and crimelords).

Nah they don't exagerrate the actual ability granted by venom just the size of the person using it.I've never seen any adaptation of Bane surpass the comicbook version when it comes to strength/durability.Sure they may have Batman using some special armour or something but i've seen nothing from these suits that impress me.

The orignal Killer Croc was very strong,near meta but NOT superhuman.His skin however was very tough(atleast under a good writer) so based on the hardness of the skin one could argue that his durability was actually meta.

He never used the tubes after Knightfall,ignoring the Infinite Crisis period and Superman/Batman.In SS he has used venom twice in the form of pills.In JSA Classified he used the tubes but they were empty,he was only pretending.

@entropy_aegis said:

@Sinestro2828 said:

@Megapants: Ah, so basically TV and movies have exaggerated the effectiveness of venom in order to make Bane appear more powerful and menacing. The comic book Venom doesn't really give a person true super strength, just peak human strength, enough to give you an edge over a normal person but not enough to make you a one man army, i.e. a petty thug hopped up on venom won't instantly become Bane 2.0 & be able to bust through prison walls and take on the entire Gotham City police force & stuff like that.

But, if thats the case, then how did he defeat Killer Croc? I thought Croc did actually possess super strength, enough to bust through steel and concrete and rip normal people apart even if he's not in the same weight class as guys like Superman or Martian Manhunter. I was under the impression that Bane defeated Croc using venom to boost his power to when he was simply able to overwhelm him completely (did he really just use skill to beat a far stronger opponent like Batman does?). It also kinda makes his venom delivery system, the tubes, appear a bit impractical if venom isn't really this unstable, monstrously strength enhancing super drug that needs to be carefully regulated to control how much of a boost it gives him...Wouldn't a pill, drink, or injection be simpler? It still looks cool of course, just seems unnecessary.

At any rate, this news makes Bane's defeat of Batman somewhat more impressive cuz his victory was more about real warrior skill & training than unbeatable super strength, though on the other hand it limits his ability to be a bigger player in the super villain community outside of Gotham (which has few super powered villains and more scheming psychopaths and crimelords).

Nah they don't exagerrate the actual ability granted by venom just the size of the person using it.I've never seen any adaptation of Bane surpass the comicbook version when it comes to strength/durability.Sure they may have Batman using some special armour or something but i've seen nothing from these suits that impress me.

The orignal Killer Croc was very strong,near meta but NOT superhuman.His skin however was very tough(atleast under a good writer) so based on the hardness of the skin one could argue that his durability was actually meta.

He never used the tubes after Knightfall,ignoring the Infinite Crisis period and Superman/Batman.In SS he has used venom twice in the form of pills.In JSA Classified he used the tubes but they were empty,he was only pretending.

Just pointing out that the version of Bane from the "The Batman" cartoon had him throwing cars around with ease, ripping the doors off of bank vaults, and surviving explosions without a scratch, when the comic book version of Bane (when he was on venom) never showed evidence of being anywhere close to that level of strength and durability.

He was also able to give Superman a pounding without breaking every bone in his hands in the 1990's animated series, although he was using a "new and improved" version of venom in that episode, and Superman's strength fluctuated a lot throughout that show, so I personally let it slide a bit on that particular occasion.

@Megapants: Yeah, I remember that episode of the Batman/Superman Adventures you're talking about, I always chalked it up to Bane being more powerful than normal thanks to his augmented venom drug AND because Superman was holding back as much as he could so as to not give away his true identity (since he was masquerading as the missing Batman so the villains wouldn't run rampant). If Supes had used his full strength he could have defeated Bane even more easily than he did, but couldn't go too far without giving himself away.