POP! Marvel Black Suit Spider-Man

Series: POP! Marvel

Year: 2015

RRP: $16.95

Though I own a whole bunch of POPs, this is actually the first Peter Parker Spider-Man I’ve bought. I’ve toyed with getting one of the comics-based ones, but to be honest I’m just not that huge a fan of him these days. But the Black Suit (or Symbiote suit, if you want to get technical) is probably my favourite costume of all the different versions he’s had over the years.

To cut a long story short, Spider-Man was on an alien planet as part of the Secret Wars (the 1980s one, not the 2015 one), and ended up bringing an alien life form back to earth with him – the symbiote. After a while, Spider-Man worked out that his new “suit” was causing him a few problems and got rid of it. But eventually it would find a new host – Eddie Brock, who we all know as that most 90s of comic villains, Venom.

Like his series/wave-mate Spider-Man 2099, this figure is built on the basic body, with the details coming from the tampos and paintwork. This might seem a little cheap, but it’s actually pretty true to the first appearance of the suit – you’ll notice there are a few blue highlights, but it’s otherwise flat and solid black. Blue highlights often look rubbish when translated to 3D form, so I’m glad that they have been left off here. 

This guy has been out in the US for a while, so far as I understand, but only seems to have made his way to Australia in the last month or so. The whole wave is Spider-Man themed, featuring the Punisher (who debuted in Spider-Man comic, before you get on your high horse), Venom and Spider-Man 2099. It’s a welcome change from the last couple of years; save for the X-Men wave released earlier in 2015, Marvel POPs! have been very heavily dominated by the movie universe for a couple of years. Most of these are great, of course, but it’s good to have some comic-based stuff too. This guy is highly recommended for Spider-fans. Hopefully we’ll soon see an Iron Spider released too.

Funko POP! Marvel: Venom

Company: Funko

Series: POP! Marvel 

Year: 2015

If we rewind time back to the early- to mid-1990s, take a trip down to the local newsagent and pick up a comic book, the odds are pretty strong that it will be DARK and EDGY, filled with impossibly muscular men and woman who do SERIOUS THINGS while looking GRIM AND DETERMINED. Not because it really serves the plot, enhances the character or anything like that, but it’s mostly because that’s what the trend was at the time. You thought Batman was dark and brooding in the 70s or the 80s? Well, old man, SPAWN is here and he’s got more inner turmoil and EDGY ARTWORK than a thousand Frank Millers could ever bring to boring old Batman.  

It’s easy to make fun of the “90s edge”, of course, but it did give us some fun comics and some very cool characters – one of them being Venom (even though he debuted in 1988). He has a cast a long shadow over the Spider-Man Universe that very few characters will ever manage to equal. Time has diluted his impact and character design, and he’s been spun-off into a zillion different other symbiotes – but though I’ve never been particularly huge Spider-Man fan, I have a lot of respect for Venom. Which is why I picked up this Funko POP!

I mentioned in my Spider-Man 2099 review that Funko had presumably released that figure to get a new character into circulation with minimum cost. Well, at least some of these cost-savings have been funnelled into Venom – he’s got an elaborate head with sculpted eyes, spiky teeth and protruding tongue. His legs and torso seem to be from the basic Funko body, but the arms and hands are all new – his fingers are long and claw-like, which befits the character’s vicious streak. The regular body just would have done it here.  

The sculpting work is great, but on the downside, paint is likely to be an issue. Venom’s “spider logo” is pretty clean I’ve seen on the three examples I’ve run into in person – but the face is a different story. The mouth, tongue and teeth are likely to have small points of slop that you’ll have to be okay with, but the eyes are a little tricker. Depending on the example you find, they can be pretty good – like the pictured example – but the chances of issues like missing spots or overspray are quite high. Such is the nature of buying POPs. Funko’s improved a lot, but there’s still plenty of room for more improvement. 

Though I don’t think he’s perfect – I always imagine Venom being particularly large in comparison with regular characters, and he’s kind of regular height here – I think he’s turned out pretty darn well. As with Spider-Man 2099, this guy is highly recommended for any Spider-fan and for anyone who likes the 1990s in general.