Spider-Man: Maximum Venom finally made its return after over a month since the last new episode aired with “Vengeance of Venom.” This episode picked up right where “Amazing Friends” left off as Spider-Men Peter Parker and Miles Morales continued their team-up with Ironheart, Doctor Strange, Baby Groot, and Amadeus Cho’s Hulk as they defend Earth against the incoming Symbiote invasion. Things didn’t go as planned as the team came up against a Symbiote controlled Avengers and things just went from bad to worse from there until a certain Moon Knight made his presence felt.
Now before getting into the content of this episode, the schedule for Spider-Man: Maximum Venom has really hurt the momentum created by each episode. The extended break between new episodes makes it tough to remember everything that happened before. With how the schedule has worked out Spider-Man: Maximum Venom will definitely be much better as a binging experience when all the episodes are on Disney+ rather than watching when the new episodes premiere.
That schedule problem out of the way, “Vengeance of Venom” does a very good job of not only picking up where the previous episode left off but also making the entire hour-long episode feel like two parts. I was reminded of a comic book event while watching this hour-long episode. You see how these first three episodes of Spider-Man: Maximum Venom all led to how things concluded in “Vengeance of Venom.”
The thing that I continue to be most impressed by this particular season is the writing for the characters in each episode. The show’s staff has found the voice for all the characters that exist in this version of the Marvel Universe. Even when there is everyone from the Spider-Team, Avengers, and other random New York City heroes, the episode never gets lost in who is involved. Both the show’s writers and voice actors know how these characters should sound and how they would react against this Symbiote invasion.
Once again, the standout dynamic was that of Peter Parker and Riri Williams. These last two episodes have shown Peter and Riri have natural chemistry with each other. Which we see shine when Spider-Man and Ironheart ended up the last heroes standing for a period of time. With the show’s overall setting of Horizon High School, it would be great to see Riri become more of a permanent cast member as her interactions with Peter and Miles have been great thus far.
The Spider-Team’s involvement was a bit of mix bag. On one hand, it was great to Peter and Miles’ Spider-Man teaming up with Spider-Gwen, Spider-Girl, and Hobgoblin again. When given the time all five characters have a great dynamic. And we see how far they have each come as we see the Spider-Team hold their own against the Symbiote infected Avengers for a period.
Unfortunately, the dynamic within the Spider-Team did not last very long. This highlights how it becomes rarer to see Peter interact with anyone other than Miles in his peer group. This show likes keeping Peter away from connecting with all his classmates for some reason. I do hope that changes because Gwen, Anya, and Harry all bring great energy to the episodes they are allowed to be a part of the main story.
Moon Knight’s involvement in this episode was a nice surprise. We don’t normally see Moon Knight take on a prominent role in these types of big event stories. He came across as a major wildcard, which is very fitting for the character. The show captured the unique hero Moon Knight is with his multiple personalities.
The role Aunt May took on was probably the biggest surprise. Aunt May hasn’t been a major supporting cast member in this show. But with how she got involved in this episode it will be interesting if this season builds towards Peter revealing his secret of being Spider-Man to Aunt May before Maximum Venom is over. That is at least what “Vengeance of Venom” seems to hint with how the episode ended.
Overall, “Vengeance of Venom” did a good job presenting the Symbiotes from Planet Klyntar be a major threat. This hour-long episode gave Spider-Man and his allies very little time to rest. With how many Marvel heroes got involved this episode did a good job at balancing the story so it never overwhelmed the audience. The ending of “Vengeance of Venom” also sets up several possible storylines for the rest of this season to follow-up on whenever we get more new episodes.
Episode Rating: 8 Night Girls out of 10
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