Venom is Spider-Man’s Brother in Marvel’s Future

Great heroes and villains often have a relationship that goes beyond simple animosity. Surrogate sisters Gamora and Nebula fought for their father Thanos’ approval in the MCU version of Guardians of the Galaxy. Cain Marko (aka Juggernaut)’s battles with the X-Men stem from his original feud with his step-brother Charles Xavier. And in the alternate future of 2099, Spider-Man and Venom learn they have far more in common than an alien symbiote.

In the mainstream Marvel Universe, Venom is a twisted reflection of Spider-Man but doesn’t share any family ties with him beyond their bond with the symbiote. In the Ultimate Universe, a reimagined Peter Parker and Eddie Brock were actually childhood friends thanks in part to the partnership between their scientist parents who created the Ultimate version of the Venom symbiote. In the 2009 Marvel Universe, however, Venom and Spider-Man’s relationship becomes even closer thanks to some disturbing family secrets.

In the future, Spider-Man is Miguel O’Hara, a gifted geneticist who works for Alchemax, one of the most powerful corporations in the world. Alchemax actually recruited Miguel when he was still a boy after seeing his incredibly high IQ scores. Miguel was subsequently sent to the Alchemax School for Gifted Youngsters where Alchemax trained its best and brightest, grooming them to be future employees.

From the beginning, Miguel proved a promising student — but he also acquired an enemy in Kron Stone, a sadistic student who dumped water over Miguel’s head on his first day in school and later tried to drown him in the swimming pool. It didn’t help that Kron was the son of Tyler Stone, an executive at Alchemax, which seemingly made Kron immune to any real punishment. Miguel finally stood up to Kron when the young sadist tried to assault Miguel’s friend, Xina Kwan, causing Kron to beat Miguel up.

Ultimately, Miguel was able to trick Kron into admitting he’d attempted to murder him in front of the school board and Kron was expelled. Years later, Kron – now an Alchemax CEO and more sadistic than ever – murdered the family of Jake Gallows, a policeman. In retaliation, Jake became the new Punisher, hunted down Kron, and left him to die in the sewer. Kron’s body was supposedly cremated and delivered to his father, who showed how little he cared about his son by flushing his ashes down the toilet.

In reality, Kron survived his immediate injuries but was still in danger of dying until he encountered a mysterious black mass in the sewers. The mass turned out to be the original Venom symbiote (who now called himself “Venom”). Venom bonded with Kron and explained that it had mutated over the years, allowing it to now manifest acidic blood and saliva. The two remained in the sewers for some time, allowing Kron to heal from his injuries, before emerging to cause even more mayhem.

Meanwhile, Miguel had grown up to be one of Alchemax’s best geneticists and was working on a project designed to rewrite a person’s genetic code to give him the powers of Spider-Man. When Tyler Stone slipped a drug into Miguel’s drink that would force him to work for Alchemax permanently (as the company was the only legal supplier of the drug), Miguel decided to run a genetic experiment that would revert his DNA to its pre-addicted state. Instead, an accident caused Miguel to become a test subject in his own spider-program and he became the new Spider-Man.

Later, however, Miguel overheard a conversation between his mother Conchata, and Tyler and learned the drug Tyler had slipped into his drink was a fake and would have worked its way out of his system naturally. To Miguel’s horror, Tyler revealed the reason he couldn’t bring himself to permanently injure Miguel was because he was his birth father thanks to an affair he had with Conchata. This also made Kron Miguel’s older brother, although Kron himself was unaware of their blood connection.

Miguel kept this revelation a secret from most people, but then later, Kron reappeared as Venom, requiring Miguel to switch to Spider-Man and protect Venom’s victims. Unfortunately, Venom proved even harder to beat in the future than he was in the past. Not only was he superhumanly strong, fast, and agile — he could turn Kron’s flesh-and-blood body into a liquid-like substance that allowed objects to pass through him harmlessly. This proved fatal for Miguel’s fiancé Dana after Venom took her hostage, allowed the police to shoot him, and let the bullets pass through him to hit her.

Heartbroken and enraged (and still unaware of Venom’s true identity), Miguel conducted some experiments on a piece of the Venom symbiote and learned of its vulnerability to sound. Using Alchemax’s resources, he had a key frequency broadcast around the city, weakening Venom and allowing Spider-Man to get the upper hand. Miguel savagely beat Venom almost to death but stopped when the symbiote collapsed and he realized Kron Stone was its human host.

Miguel then took Kron and the symbiote back to Alchemax where he kept them locked in separate containment cells. When Kron refused to answer any questions about the symbiote or how he survived, Miguel offered to fight him hand-to-hand, with Kron agreeing to talk if he lost. Of course, thanks to Miguel’s spider-powers, he easily subdued his half-brother — and then proceeded to keep beating him into a bloody pulp in retaliation for all the pain he’d caused him over the years.

Afterward, Kron confessed to everything, but by then the damage he’d done to Miguel and his family was complete. Dana was buried and Miguel’s other brother Gabriel (actually his half-brother since they didn’t share the same father) was furious that Miguel wasn’t able to protect Dana from Venom. Kron remained locked up, but the Venom symbiote itself escaped after bonding with Roman, the future Sub-Mariner, and diving into the ocean.

While there have been multiple versions of Venom over the years, Kron Stone is easily one of the most vicious, thanks to his ability to hurt Spider-Man emotionally as well as physically. His role in the death of Miguel’s fiancé mirrors the way the Green Goblin killed Peter Parker’s girlfriend Gwen Stacy in the mainstream Marvel Universe and while Kron’s criminal career as Venom was short-lived, he still managed to do a lot of lasting damage. Ironically, Kron never discovered he was related to Miguel, but one suspects he would have used this as a reason to hurt him even more if he knew about their blood bonds.

About The Author

Michael Jung
(700 Articles Published)

See also  Solo Co-Writer Confirms Anthony Ingruber Auditioned For Han

Michael Jung is a mild-mannered freelance writer-for-hire, actor, and professional storyteller with a keen interest in pop culture, education, nonprofit organizations, and unusual side hustles. His work has been featured in Screen Rant, ASU Now, Sell Books Fast, Study.com, and Free Arts among others. A graduate of Arizona State University with a PhD in 20^th Century American Literature, Michael has written novels, short stories, stage plays, screenplays, and how-to manuals.

Michael’s background in storytelling draws him to find the most fascinating aspects of any topic and transform them into a narrative that informs and entertains the reader. Thanks to a life spent immersed in comic books and movies, Michael is always ready to infuse his articles with offbeat bits of trivia for an extra layer of fun. In his spare time, you can find him entertaining kids as Spider-Man or Darth Vader at birthday parties or scaring the heck out of them at haunted houses.

Visit Michael Jung’s website for information on how to hire him, follow him on Twitter Michael50834213, or contact him directly: michael(at)michaeljungwriter(dot)com.

More From Michael Jung