Marvel Rivals’ Teased Venom Skin Opens a Pandora’s Box That It Can’t Close

Marvel Rivals is going full steam ahead toward Season 3 now with its usual rollout of content announcements and streamer early access privileges. Marvel Rivals Season 3 launches on July 11, the same day that James Gunn’s Superman releases in theaters, and a lot of what it has to offer has now either been revealed in Dev Vision Vol. 07 by creator director Guangguang and lead combat designer Zhiyong, its season previews via content creators on Twitch, or other lore tidbits posted on X/Twitter.

It was because of content creator previews that players first saw confirmation of a black symbiote-suited Spider-Man for Marvel Rivals as a part of the Season 3 BattlePass, titled “Power of the Phoenix,” and that it accompanies an Evil Dance emote that references Tobey Maguire’s iconic dance sequence in Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 3. However, despite his presence seeming non-existent in terms of cosmetics so far, Venom has a massive role in this upcoming season’s lore and has had a costume teased that would not only be his most unique yet but also a potential game-changer for other characters’ skins in the future.

Marvel Rivals: All Leaked and Confirmed Season 3 Skins So Far

Marvel Rivals’ Season 3 is confirmed to start on July 11, and NetEase Games unveiled an impressive lineup of cosmetics and costumes for the shooter.

Separation Anxiety—There is No Venom Without Eddie Brock

Outside of voice lines shared between Venom and others as well as supplementary character lore, Marvel Rivals hasn’t necessarily gone out of its way to represent much about Eddie Brock, the host of the symbiote and Venom’s better or worse half, depending on who’s asked. This makes sense, though, as Eddie isn’t at all what’s interesting about Venom on paper, whereas the abilities he possesses, whether he’s depicted as parasitically or mutually bonded to the symbiote, are far more intriguing.

The second half of Venom’s biography, as it pertains to Marvel Rivals’ original lore and Timestream Entanglement story, reads:

“While displaced in time and fighting in the occult wars, Venom glimpsed the horrific future awaiting this timeline. To prevent that future from happening, Venom knows he only has two options — kill the dark god Knull or imprison him on Klyntar and take his throne.”

Nonetheless, Eddie is an inseparable element of the character, and Season 3’s lore seems to be emphasizing that with a big role in the narrative and a skin that is unlike any Marvel Rivals costumes to date. Indeed, Eddie’s face being distinctly displayed in artwork for Venom’s second lore entry thumbnail and an upcoming Season 3 or 3.5 gallery card clearly suggests that a future skin will feature this unprecedented aesthetic.

What Venom’s Phoenix Force Skin Could Mean for Marvel Rivals

Marvel Rivals’ so-called ‘Phoenix Force’ Venom skin would presumably have Eddie’s face exposed, emerging from the symbiote’s throat and wreathed in monstrous teeth. Despite being an iconic trope of Venom’s from other source material iterations, the reason why this would be exceptional in Marvel Rivals’ costume catalog is twofold: firstly, Eddie’s face is now revealed in-game; and secondly, it opens the door to other creative costume choices based on a character being unmasked when they’re traditionally masked—or have their head swallowed by an alien organism, in Eddie’s case.

This won’t be the first time Marvel Rivals has unmasked an otherwise masked character, to be fair, as Peter Parker is seen unmasked in the MVP cinematic for the Bag-Man Beyond skin, and Black Panther has had multiple skins now where he’s unmasked. Regardless, Venom has only had skins so far that leaned on the symbiote and have been more or less creatively lacking, such as his Hyper Orange and Pink Bubble color swaps.

Of course, it’s possible that Eddie’s face being shown in ‘Phoenix Force’ may only be associated with an emote animation and not the skin itself, which could be disappointing if it’s not at least a toggleable skin change like Spider-Man’s Future Foundation costume turning black when the Identity Overhaul emote is inputted.

Venom’s melee animation elongating his head for a bite attack wouldn’t necessarily be an issue, either, if the symbiote could be animated to close its jaws over Eddie’s head. Plus, the full skin hasn’t even been revealed yet, and its mixture of symbiote and Phoenix themes will easily make it one of Venom’s most rare costumes, not unlike Ultron’s X-Tron skin. If Venom’s ‘Phoenix Force’ skin is any indication of how ingenious skins can be, Marvel Rivals’ future content has the potential for truly stunning cosmetics.