Queen in Black: Venom Unchained #2: Jailbreak!

Issue #2 of Queen in Black: Venom Unchained finally lets the comic live up to its name as Eddie Brock finds the willpower, with a tremendous assist from the symbiote Sleeper, to break free from his incarceration and join the fight against Hela. After witnessing him at his lowest point, broken by the prison system and accepting the futility of his situation, its a bit disappointing that Brock’s escape doesn’t involve more creativity or intelligence for a proper moment of redemption. The extent of his outside-the-box thinking is using Sleeper’s unique chemical abilities to blow out the prison’s wall. A hop, skip and a flap of newly-grown wings is then all it takes to make Eddie a free man.

The remainder of the issue’s story from that point on can be summarized in a few sentences. Eddie flies over the New York skyline, finding the city in disarray as Hela’s invasion is already in full motion. Him and Sleeper don’t see eye-to-eye, bickering about their intentions and differing views on this freshly-formed symbiosis. Brock kicks a little butt regardless, saves a civilian, and arrives just in time to come to the rescue of his teenage son.

What the narrative lacks in complexity, it makes up for in style as Juanan Ramirez relishes in the opportunity to pencil the most ferocious and animalistic symbiotes seen in some time. Their most striking quality is the decidedly inhuman facial profile: toothy maws and throats elongated to have the appearance of a reptile or carnivorous fish rather than a man. You get the sense that Eddie’s new form, and the evil symbiotes he fights against, would tear off chunks of their prey and swallow them whole rather than chew.

Erick Arciniega’s colors add to the pervading sense of violence. Shadows are rendered with a muddy burgundy brush, splotchy in a way that makes it seem like every environment and character is splattered with blood even when no carnage is occurring. It creates a foreboding feeling that danger is right around every corner as these symbiote soldiers walk the streets. And yet Eddie Brock’s new body has an unmistakably heroic aura to its tall, proud frame and contrasting color scheme, a sort of visual symbolism to remind the reader that despite all the viciousness, this is a superhero comic after all.