> We didn't even get to see Eddie before he was Venom, but from his back story he clearly had a screw loose. Again, in the podcast David Michelinie said that Brock was a psychopath.
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Brock sadly was never playing with a full deck, and I am convinced that him bonding with the symbiote just made him worse. If only for providing him with the opportunity to be worse, basically, the symbiote was just as keen to see Spider-Man destroyed as Brock was... So it was not all Brock's fault.
> Cletus was already a monster. He just got really ill when the symbiote left him for Ben.
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Again, yes Cletus was a despicable person, who after bonding with a symbiote, got a lot worse. That is my point entirely, both Brock and Kassidy got a lot worse from bonding with a symbiote.
> Right, but this is all years after the fact. What was the first comic book to actually portray the symbiotes as evil/aggressive? Where did it come from? It certainly wasn't in the original black costume, Venom or Carnage stories. Even the Life Foundation symbiotes in the Venom: Lethal Protector mini-series didn't make their hosts evil as far as I can recall (though I'm sure they went down that road later).
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I would say the first instance of the comics portraying symbiotes as aggressive hostile entities would have to be Ben as Spider-Carnage... The symbiote was driving Ben to do things and think things he wouldn't normally. But he was able to control it through sheer strength of character.
Also things happening years after the fact does not make it any less valid in the evolution of things. E.g. Doc Samson being Jewish. It was never stated when he first arrived in The Incredible Hulk he was Jewish till just before the Merged Hulk first showed up in #377.
I definately see where you are coming from though and you have good points of argument! There is no clear indication where somebody says "symbiotes are bad."
However, I disagree about the original black costume, the fact that it was cast out and shunned by its own kind for having a different way of doing things shows that symbiotes are not the most how shall you say... accepting of creatures ever. I think it depends on the host entirely how the symbiote behaves.
Frank taught Toxin to be good, and so Toxin learned to not be aggressive and to understand limits to how far they can go. The Black suit learned goodness and virtue from Spider-Man and in some warped way carried them to Brock.
Symbiotes take on characteristics of their host and I feel certainly from what I've seen of them over the years that they essentially just bring out bigger what is already there inside their host. So while Spider-Man never really turned aggressive because of the symbiote, had he been going through a rough patch, maybe he would have become more aggressive... pure speculation though! I do feel that certainly over the years symbiotes have been shown to enlarge the characteristics of their host.
