Marvel’s New Venom-Robots Are Cool (But Don’t Make Any Sense)

Warning: Contains Spoilers for What If Miles Morales Became Captain America #1

Among the Spider-Man villains appearing in Marvel’s What If Miles Morales Became Captain America, Venom‘s new look is by far the coolest…but it also doesn’t make too much sense. The new What If… storyline by Cody Ziglar and Paco Medina shows Miles becoming Captain America. While he doesn’t have any spider powers that he’s best known for since he never gets bitten in this timeline, this new variant is an interesting take. The shield suits him well, but it’s the cameos and roles of Spider-Man villains that make this story even more fun.

Quite a few notable villains make appearances in What If… filling the shoes of Captain America characters. For example, Tombstone becomes the most recognizable Cap nemesis as “Grey Skull,” an obvious nod to Red Skull. Tinkerer also takes the place of Armin Zola. The most shocking appearance though is Venom because it comes out of nowhere. The problem though is this new iteration of the popular Spidey villain leaves a few too many questions.

The new version of Venom first appears when Grey Skull and his group break into a power plant to put their plan into motion. When they bust down the doors, they’re greeted by an army of Venoms. What’s unique about them though is that they’re mechanical. They have robotic technology wired around their shoulders with red lights flashing and exposed robotic “skin” on their legs. The reason for this change in design is that they are robots. According to Prowler, they’re robotic soldiers that have been merged with the Venom symbiote by Norman Osborn. Herein lies the problem though: the fact that they’re robots doesn’t really make too much sense from a symbiote biology perspective.

It’s well known within the comics community that while the Venom symbiote does have the capability to temporarily take form without a host, it still needs nutrients to survive that only a host can provide. Without certain organs to feed on, the symbiote could end up dying of malnutrition. In this iteration of the character, these Venom symbiotes are merged to robotic soldiers, implying that what lies underneath is a Terminator-like skeleton. Since robots pretty much don’t need organs to survive, it makes one question how exactly the Venoms are still alive. Since they’re considered “guard dogs” by Prowler, maybe they could be feeding on intruders, but exactly how many people are breaking into this power plant? It’s impossible to say, especially since the characters are limited to only one page in the story before Prowler destroys them. On one hand, it’s possible Norman placed human organs in the robots to keep them alive. On the other, a steady supply of intruders could possibly keep the Venom-bots fed for some time.

With this series not being a one-shot as it explores Miles being multiple different Marvel heroes in the multiverse, there is a possibility that the Venom robots will come back in a future issue with other Spider-Man villains. Here’s hoping that if they do come back, more will be revealed about them. They really are a very cool design and could lead to some exciting encounters in the future. Maybe if all variants of Miles Morales come together, they could take on an entire army of them to get to the big bad of the arc. Until then though, these Venom robots are just a fun little cameo in What If Miles Morales Became Captain America with a cool design…but a lot left to be desired in how they really work as symbiotes.

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