Why didn’t the symbiotes tell their hosts who Spider-Man was? Can anyone come up with an answer for this.

[Spidercide]

Unfortunately I do not have scans handy so bare with me as I try to explain this verbally. If you want skip to the last few paragraphs to find the question I’m actually asking.

We know of course that the Venom symbiote was aware that Peter Parker was Spider-Man. It then passed that information onto it’s host Eddie Brock as it and Brock wanted revenge on Spider-Man. Whether the symbiote actively told Brock this information or if Brock asked it to tell him is unknown.

Anyway in 1997 there was a one shot called Spider-Man: the Venom Agenda where Eddie Brock forgot who Spider-Man was due to a blow to his head.

In a follow up mini-series Venom the Finale Venom still doesn’t remember Spider-Man but another blow to the head restores his memory. At the end of the story the symbiote is separated from Brock and seemingly destroyed.

Later in Howard Mackie’s run on Spider-Man the symbiote tracks Peter to his new swanky apartment and tries to bond with him. failing that it seeks out Brock. Brock doesn’t know Spider-Man’s secret identity but he does remember Spider-Man ruined his career. The symbiote bonds with Brock and they become Venom again.

But weirdly Venom still does not know Spider-Man’s secret identity but remembers he USED to know.

Jumping forward in time we get to Marvel Knights Spider-Man by Mark Millar and Brock tells Angelo Fortunato (whom he’s sold the symbiote to) that the symbiote knows who Spider-Man is and will tell Angelo if he asks it nicely. He obviously does because Angelo then tracks Peter down to his high school reunion.

In addition to all of this in the clone saga Carnage found out who Spider-Man was due to the machinations of Judas Traveller although Traveller then erased this knowledge from his mind.

However later in the Clone Saga the carnage symbiote bonded with Ben Reilly and tried to tempt him into murdering Peter when the latter came by to visit him. At the end of the story the symbiote rejoined Cletus Kasady and from then on Kasady very obviously did not know WHO Ben Reilly or Peter Parker were.

So what I’m trying to resolve is why didn’t the Venom or Carnage symbiotes TELL Brock or Kasady who Spider-Man was? The Venom symbiote still hated Peter and knew who he was and Carnage knew from Ben Reilly.

There are a few possible explanations I’ve offhandedly thought of but I don’t know how much water any of them hold so input on them and the central question would be appreciated.

a) The Carnage symbiote didn’t say anything because it doesn’t hold any animosity towards Spider-Man the way Venom does and is more chaotic and animalistic anyway. So it maybe could’ve told Cletus who Spider-Man was but it didn’t care and Cletus never knew to ask.

b) SOMEHOW Brock’s amnesia prevented the symbiote from telling Brock who Spider-Man was, maybe because they shared a mind/body so the amnesia was sort of passed onto the symbiote whilst it was bonded to Brock.

c) The Venom symbiote had a weird love/hate relationship with Spider-Man and so maybe withheld that information from Brock because it wanted to kill him but had doubts, hence it didn’t make things too easy for Brock by simply telling him where to go to kill Peter in his sleep or anything.

We know in Mackie’s run after Venom was reborn it didn’t try to kill Spider-Man until it happened to stumble across the Sinister Six attacking him, and then afterwards switched his targets to the Sinister Six themselves and then to reconciling with Brock’s wife Anne Weying. So it wasn’t like Venom was trying too hard to kill Spidey. Later still in the Jenkins’ run of Spectacular Spider-Man the symbiote and Brock outright state the symbiote wants to bond with Peter not Brock. When Peter forced Brock and the symbiote to bond it had a big hate on for Spidey which would then explain why it was all too happy to tell Angelo Fortunato who Peter was.


d) By absorbing the Carnage symbiote into itself Venom simply became crazier and more erratic

e) The laziest explanation to hand is that the symbiotes being weird alien creatures have physiologies and psychologies that are simply different to how humans behave (not to mention Venom and Carnage are regarded as insane even by their own species) and so technically they can be entirely contradictory by human standards.


Thoughts

P.S. I don’t actually regard Brock regaining his memory as much of a plothole. If he got amnesia it’s not impossible to imagine his memory could come and go so him forgetting AGAIN makes sense

[Webhead]

However later in the Clone Saga the carnage symbiote bonded with Ben Reilly and tried to tempt him into murdering Peter when the latter came by to visit him. At the end of the story the symbiote rejoined Cletus Kasady and from then on Kasady very obviously did not know WHO Ben Reilly or Peter Parker were.

The Carnage symbiote's been shown to be moderately intelligent and capable of speech in recent times, and as you point out, it goads Reilly into killing Peter, so that rules the "too animalistic" option out. You could say it didn't care either way but it's not very in character for either the symbiote or Kasady to ignore a chance to completely destroy Spider-Man.
Then again, that symbiote was eaten by Venom and replaced with a Negative Zone version, right?

c) The Venom symbiote had a weird love/hate relationship with Spider-Man and so maybe withheld that information from Brock because it wanted to kill him but had doubts, hence it didn’t make things too easy for Brock by simply telling him where to go to kill Peter in his sleep or anything. Later still in the Jenkins’ run of Spectacular Spider-Man the symbiote and Brock outright state the symbiote wants to bond with Peter not Brock. When Peter forced Brock and the symbiote to bond it had a big hate on for Spidey which would then explain why it was all too happy to tell Angelo Fortunato who Peter was.

As far as Brock/Venom goes, in that Jenkins arc, the symbiote calls Peter by name when he rejects Brock and tries to re-bond (pun intended I suppose?) with Spidey. Later, Eddie says "I'm supposed to feel this hatred for you, but for the life of me I can't remember why". So it's possible the symbiote, at this stage resenting Eddie and "taking" pieces of his mind, took it from him, and afterwards, enraged by Spidey's rejection and forceful bonding with Brock, revealed his identity to Fortunato. I haven't read MK so I'm not sure how it fits with this explanation.
Of course, the huge issue is why does Flash not know. OMD notwithstanding, it doesn't add up after the "Superior Venom" affair, that this guy the symbiote actually likes and still refuses to tell.

[Spidercide]

The Carnage symbiote's been shown to be moderately intelligent and capable of speech in recent times, and as you point out, it goads Reilly into killing Peter, so that rules the "too animalistic" option out. You could say it didn't care either way but it's not very in character for either the symbiote or Kasady to ignore a chance to completely destroy Spider-Man.
Then again, that symbiote was eaten by Venom and replaced with a Negative Zone version, right?

As far as Brock/Venom goes, in that Jenkins arc, the symbiote calls Peter by name when he rejects Brock and tries to re-bond (pun intended I suppose?) with Spidey. Later, Eddie says "I'm supposed to feel this hatred for you, but for the life of me I can't remember why". So it's possible the symbiote, at this stage resenting Eddie and "taking" pieces of his mind, took it from him, and afterwards, enraged by Spidey's rejection and forceful bonding with Brock, revealed his identity to Fortunato. I haven't read MK so I'm not sure how it fits with this explanation.
Of course, the huge issue is why does Flash not know. OMD notwithstanding, it doesn't add up after the "Superior Venom" affair, that this guy the symbiote actually likes and still refuses to tell.

Well maybe animalistic isn't the right word. When it bonded to Ben it just wanted blood as it always does. It's not like Venom who has a grudge to bear and actively seeks out retribution it just wants to kill. So it wouldn't necesarilly bother telling Carnage Peter Parker is Spider-Man. It might've told him Ben Reilly is Spider-Man and where to find him if Kasady asked but by the time Carnage got free Ben was dead. So Kasady and the symbiote being simple creatures who just like to kill maybe didn't even bother finding out who Spider-Man was, figuring they'd find him sooner or later.

Brock's lack of memory over Peter's identity isn't really the problem, it's why the symbiote didn't tell him. It maybe makes sense in Jenkins run but what about before then?

Again, maybe the symbiotes kust don't think like humans do and don't tell their hosts anything that isn't directly asked of them or else they just contradict themselves.

[Pav]

Other than B, I think the OP really covered all the possible reasons - and it's potentially a combination of many.

As far as Carnage not knowing Peter and/or Ben after becoming Spider-Carnage, one could point to a number of things:

1) The symbiote wasn't bonded long/fully enough to Ben to keep memories/knowledge, maybe.
2) You could say that Judas Traveller's "spell" on Carnage was still in effect.
3) Plus, it's a totally new symbiote due to that underwhelming story by Howard Mackie.

Personally, I think it'd be fun to get a comic that really utilizes continuity to establish "definitive rules" about symbiotes.

-Pav, who loves Spider-Carnage...

[Huntsman Spider]

Other than B, I think the OP really covered all the possible reasons - and it's potentially a combination of many.

As far as Carnage not knowing Peter and/or Ben after becoming Spider-Carnage, one could point to a number of things:

1) The symbiote wasn't bonded long/fully enough to Ben to keep memories/knowledge, maybe.
2) You could say that Judas Traveller's "spell" on Carnage was still in effect.
3) Plus, it's a totally new symbiote due to that underwhelming story by Howard Mackie.

Personally, I think it'd be fun to get a comic that really utilizes continuity to establish "definitive rules" about symbiotes.

-Pav, who loves Spider-Carnage...

Same here, though mostly the version from the series finale of the 90s cartoon, who was basically what Peter Parker could have become if he let the tragedies and hardships of his life push him past the breaking point, only exacerbated by a homicidal symbiote that warped his feelings of alienation and angst into outright mania to destroy absolutely everything that ever existed across reality. His last moments with the armored billionaire Spider-Man's Uncle Ben and then his self-sacrifice to ensure that he and the symbiote would no longer be a threat to any more innocent lives really stuck with me as I got old enough to understand more of the nuances of Spider-Man's character and storylines.

[Ursalink]

Spidercide, you are totally wrong. The symbiotes did tell their hosts who was Spider-Man. Venom's knew it after bonding with Eddie Brock. When Mac Gargan (the Scorpion) became Venom for a while, he discovered Spidey's secret too. And technically, Carnage knew that too, between his link to his "dad" (Venom) and his temporal bond with Ben Reilly and others. However, Carnage didn't have a personal vendetta against Spidey like classic Venom; because he considered killing one person was the same as any other.

But after "One More Day", the Spider-Marriage was erased, and the knowledge of Peter Parker's secret identity too, from practially everyone except Mary Jane. That included his enemies, like Norman Osborn and the Symbiotes. When he was bonded to the Scorpion, Venom's symbiote tried to trace Spider-Man and detected his "previous host". He entered into a building thinking it had found Spider-Man, but actually, he found another "previous host", Eddie Brock. And when he tried to possess him again, it accidentally created Anti-Venom.

During "Superior Spider-Junk", the Venom's symbiote bonded temporally with Spider-Ock, creating "Superior Venom". When the Symbiote returned with Flash, he asked him about what was happening inside "Spider-Man's" head, but he said it was like "two frequencies in the same radio". That was because, while Ock was mainly taking control, Peter Parker's mind was slowly reawakening inside of his brain. That was what made Venom incapable of read "Spider-Man's" mind, thus protecting his secret identity.

[FF-Fighter]

Other than B, I think the OP really covered all the possible reasons - and it's potentially a combination of many.

As far as Carnage not knowing Peter and/or Ben after becoming Spider-Carnage, one could point to a number of things:

1) The symbiote wasn't bonded long/fully enough to Ben to keep memories/knowledge, maybe.
2) You could say that Judas Traveller's "spell" on Carnage was still in effect.
3) Plus, it's a totally new symbiote due to that underwhelming story by Howard Mackie.

Personally, I think it'd be fun to get a comic that really utilizes continuity to establish "definitive rules" about symbiotes.

-Pav, who loves Spider-Carnage...

The thing about the symbiotes that confuses me is how they look. In Secret Wars #8, when Spidey comes across the Symbiote, it just looks like a blob. Then, when it attaches to him, it get his eye pieces added to it permanently I guess. After a while, it passes to venom where it gets its teeth.

But, in the Planet of the Symbiotes story, they all look like that. They should all look like black blobby things, or their other hosts, not like Spidey/Venom.

[Venomous Mask]

Spidercide, you are totally wrong. The symbiotes did tell their hosts who was Spider-Man. Venom's knew it after bonding with Eddie Brock. When Mac Gargan (the Scorpion) became Venom for a while, he discovered Spidey's secret too. And technically, Carnage knew that too, between his link to his "dad" (Venom) and his temporal bond with Ben Reilly and others. However, Carnage didn't have a personal vendetta against Spidey like classic Venom; because he considered killing one person was the same as any other.

Carnage may not have had a vendetta against Peter Parker, but if you recall, he was writing Peter's name on the walls of his cell, stating that once he had broken out, he would chop up Peter's loved ones and put them in garbage bags. He absolutely intended to use that knowledge, it's just that Traveller wiped away the knowledge. As for Spider-Carnage, it's possible that the symbiote did not want Kasady to have the knowledge for some reason. When it comes to Venom, in PPSM #9, the symbiote went looking for Peter and called him by name, yet Venom later did not know Peter's identity. The events in The Hunger lead me to believe that this was deliberate; given his behavior in Venom Agenda, had Eddie known Peter's identity, he probably would have absolutely wrecked Peter's life. The symbiote did not want that as that would completely rule out Peter ever wanting to re-bond to it, hence the decision to block the information about Spider-Man's identity.

The thing about the symbiotes that confuses me is how they look. In Secret Wars #8, when Spidey comes across the Symbiote, it just looks like a blob. Then, when it attaches to him, it get his eye pieces added to it permanently I guess. After a while, it passes to venom where it gets its teeth.

But, in the Planet of the Symbiotes story, they all look like that. They should all look like black blobby things, or their other hosts, not like Spidey/Venom.

The symbiote was initially very different from other symbiotes in that it wanted to bond with its host, not consume it; it was in fact slated for execution before Spidey found it. When it did bond to Spider-Man, that probably brought out its altruistic tendencies even more; also, taking the form of a fanged monster would have blown its cover. When it bonded to Brock, however, the dual hatred they have probably reverted it to a more predatory nature, thus it took on a more monstrous form. It's interesting to note that between #300 and 346 of ASM, Venom becomes progressively more gruesome, from just having regular human teeth to having incisors sticking out everywhere. I've always believed that the teeth were an evolutionary adaptation to allow symbiotes to consume prey that they couldn't take over.

[Spidercide]

Spidercide, you are totally wrong. The symbiotes did tell their hosts who was Spider-Man. Venom's knew it after bonding with Eddie Brock. When Mac Gargan (the Scorpion) became Venom for a while, he discovered Spidey's secret too. And technically, Carnage knew that too, between his link to his "dad" (Venom) and his temporal bond with Ben Reilly and others. However, Carnage didn't have a personal vendetta against Spidey like classic Venom; because he considered killing one person was the same as any other.

But after "One More Day", the Spider-Marriage was erased, and the knowledge of Peter Parker's secret identity too, from practially everyone except Mary Jane. That included his enemies, like Norman Osborn and the Symbiotes. When he was bonded to the Scorpion, Venom's symbiote tried to trace Spider-Man and detected his "previous host". He entered into a building thinking it had found Spider-Man, but actually, he found another "previous host", Eddie Brock. And when he tried to possess him again, it accidentally created Anti-Venom.

During "Superior Spider-Junk", the Venom's symbiote bonded temporally with Spider-Ock, creating "Superior Venom". When the Symbiote returned with Flash, he asked him about what was happening inside "Spider-Man's" head, but he said it was like "two frequencies in the same radio". That was because, while Ock was mainly taking control, Peter Parker's mind was slowly reawakening inside of his brain. That was what made Venom incapable of read "Spider-Man's" mind, thus protecting his secret identity.

That's not got anything to do with what I was asking though

My issue isn't with OMD but the stuff before it circa Howard Mackie's run and the Clone Saga.

Carnage knew who Ben was as did Venom but carnage never told Cletus and venom never told Eddie who Peter was even though he'd told him back when they originally bonded.

[Spidercide]

Carnage may not have had a vendetta against Peter Parker, but if you recall, he was writing Peter's name on the walls of his cell, stating that once he had broken out, he would chop up Peter's loved ones and put them in garbage bags. He absolutely intended to use that knowledge, it's just that Traveller wiped away the knowledge. As for Spider-Carnage, it's possible that the symbiote did not want Kasady to have the knowledge for some reason. When it comes to Venom, in PPSM #9, the symbiote went looking for Peter and called him by name, yet Venom later did not know Peter's identity. The events in The Hunger lead me to believe that this was deliberate; given his behavior in Venom Agenda, had Eddie known Peter's identity, he probably would have absolutely wrecked Peter's life. The symbiote did not want that as that would completely rule out Peter ever wanting to re-bond to it, hence the decision to block the information about Spider-Man's identity.



The symbiote was initially very different from other symbiotes in that it wanted to bond with its host, not consume it; it was in fact slated for execution before Spidey found it. When it did bond to Spider-Man, that probably brought out its altruistic tendencies even more; also, taking the form of a fanged monster would have blown its cover. When it bonded to Brock, however, the dual hatred they have probably reverted it to a more predatory nature, thus it took on a more monstrous form. It's interesting to note that between #300 and 346 of ASM, Venom becomes progressively more gruesome, from just having regular human teeth to having incisors sticking out everywhere. I've always believed that the teeth were an evolutionary adaptation to allow symbiotes to consume prey that they couldn't take over.

2 points:

a) But didn't the symbiote after it rebonded with Brock attempt to kill Peter as Spider-Man anyway? Unless it's going all the way back to like the second venom story which established it hates and wants to kill Peter but also kind of doesn't because it wants him back. is it just a complicated love/hate dynamic mixed in with it being obviously nuts? Or else maybe it was so weakened when it bonded with Brock it let Brock 'do the driving'

b) Do you think Brock really would've told anyone who Spider-Man was? He never did it before, was hung up on innocent people like his wife or aunt getting hurt and didn't he want to kill Spider-Man himself anyway?

c) This raises another question of why Peter and Mary Jane never seemed all that stressed about Venom revealing Peter's secret to anybody thoughts on that please?

[Venomous Mask]

a) But didn't the symbiote after it rebonded with Brock attempt to kill Peter as Spider-Man anyway? Unless it's going all the way back to like the second venom story which established it hates and wants to kill Peter but also kind of doesn't because it wants him back. is it just a complicated love/hate dynamic mixed in with it being obviously nuts? Or else maybe it was so weakened when it bonded with Brock it let Brock 'do the driving'

Brock was in the driver's seat, but if you look at Venom's behavior then, almost all of the nuanced behavior of the lethal protector was gone, and was replaced by a personality where Venom would attempt to kill just about anyone who pissed him off, like the Sinister Six (also, remember how he was randomly killing people in the Daily Bugle). This may have been due to the influence of the absorbed Carnage symbiote, but PPSM #10 seems to hint that Venom spewed it back up (the version in the Negative Zone I believe was the original, or a fragment which jump-started the cells in Kasady's body). Regardless, whenever Brock was Venom during the Mackie run, Eddie may have been in control but the symbiote's personality shone through far more than it had before. And I do think you're right about the love/hate relationship; the Venom symbiote wants to re-bond with Spider-Man, but when that seems to be out of the question, it reverts to wanting to disembowel him.

b) Do you think Brock really would've told anyone who Spider-Man was? He never did it before, was hung up on innocent people like his wife or aunt getting hurt and didn't he want to kill Spider-Man himself anyway?

At the end of The Venom Agenda, he told Spider-Man that all bets were off and that he was going to spill everything on talk shows and the like. Also, a few pages before, he was ready to kill MJ just because of her relationship to Peter:



In the very first Venom stories, Brock told Peter that he would not hurt any of his family as long as Peter "played by the rules." Even throughout his anti-hero days, Venom was always a hair's breath away from becoming a straight villain again, like what happened in The Exile Returns.

c) This raises another question of why Peter and Mary Jane never seemed all that stressed about Venom revealing Peter's secret to anybody thoughts on that please?[/QUOTE]

They both knew that Venom wanted to keep Spider-Man to himself, like when Venom stopped a robber from hurting Peter. That being said, Peter sent Mary Jane away on a train since Venom's insanity made him unpredictable.

[Spidercide]

Brock was in the driver's seat, but if you look at Venom's behavior then, almost all of the nuanced behavior of the lethal protector was gone, and was replaced by a personality where Venom would attempt to kill just about anyone who pissed him off, like the Sinister Six (also, remember how he was randomly killing people in the Daily Bugle). This may have been due to the influence of the absorbed Carnage symbiote, but PPSM #10 seems to hint that Venom spewed it back up (the version in the Negative Zone I believe was the original, or a fragment which jump-started the cells in Kasady's body). Regardless, whenever Brock was Venom during the Mackie run, Eddie may have been in control but the symbiote's personality shone through far more than it had before. And I do think you're right about the love/hate relationship; the Venom symbiote wants to re-bond with Spider-Man, but when that seems to be out of the question, it reverts to wanting to disembowel him.



At the end of The Venom Agenda, he told Spider-Man that all bets were off and that he was going to spill everything on talk shows and the like. Also, a few pages before, he was ready to kill MJ just because of her relationship to Peter:



In the very first Venom stories, Brock told Peter that he would not hurt any of his family as long as Peter "played by the rules." Even throughout his anti-hero days, Venom was always a hair's breath away from becoming a straight villain again, like what happened in The Exile Returns.

c) This raises another question of why Peter and Mary Jane never seemed all that stressed about Venom revealing Peter's secret to anybody thoughts on that please?

They both knew that Venom wanted to keep Spider-Man to himself, like when Venom stopped a robber from hurting Peter. That being said, Peter sent Mary Jane away on a train since Venom's insanity made him unpredictable.[/QUOTE]

But that's my points.

In the Venom Agenda Venom was going against his established personality in saying he'd tell people.

After the first Venom story they didn't yet know about Venom's hang up for innocents nor his desire to keep Spider-Man to himself so they didn't know he'd keep that thing a secret. And as you say he's unpredictable. This ties into another debate I've had over how responsible Peter was in abandonning Venom on the island back in the day but that's another thread. I dunno, maybe some of their attitude towards Venom can be chalked up to

"We can't do anything about it so let's just try to live as best we can for the moment." They did that with Chameleon and Doc Ock and Norman Osborn too, though I'm debating with myself how in character or justified that is.