Venom #22 – Review

By: Rick Remender (writer), Declan Shalvey (art), Lee Loughridge (colors), and Joe Caramagna (letters)

The Story: What better way for series mastermind Rick Remender to say farewell than one final fight between Venom and Jack O’ Lantern and on Father’s Day, no less?

The Review:  This issue is a true swansong for Rick Remender’s fantastic run on Venom; it showcases so much of what Remender has managed to accomplish over the course of these 22 issues.

As such, it’s a character-driven issue and one that’s incredibly  heavy as a result.  It focuses on the humanity that Remender imbued Flash Thompson with and the lasting scars of his abuse as a child.  In this sense, the issue is as much a polemic against child abuse as it is an introverted character study of Flash.  It’s an extremely sincere issues, when that punches you in the gut, making it impossible not to empathize with Flash.  Again, that this issue has so much weight is a testament to and a reminder of how much Remender has accomplished in this series; we’ve grown so invested in Flash over the course of the series that all of these painful flashbacks feel truly, well, painful.  Despite this being the last issue of his run, Remender is still letting us enter deep into the mind of Flash Thompson, showing what makes the character tick, and it’s still excellent.