Carnage U.S.A. #4

Background

Mercury Team followed Doppelganger to Last Chance Church in Doverton, where they were attacked by a mob of citizens possessed by the Carnage symbiote. Spider-Man followed Hannah and her kids back to town after they attempted to kill her husband, Eric. Captain America managed to break free from Carnage's influence just long enough to send a call for backup, who came in the guise of Agent Venom.

Story 'Part Four: Oh Say Can You Scream!'

At the Ralsby Family Estate, Spider-Man tried to be inspiring. Holding a rifle over his head as he stood on a pickup truck, he attempted to galvanize the townsfolk into going back to Doverton. He asked Eric to take the gun, since guns weren't really his thing. He went on to say that he didn't like the idea of them following him back to fight a psychopath, his alien monster and his other alien monster but then got distracted by the gorilla staring at him. One of the audience members shooed the gorilla away and Spidey asked if they were just going to let the zoo animals roam free. Eric said they didn't have a choice after he rammed the fence. "That's probably gonna be trouble," Spider-Man grumbled.

In Doverton, Mercury Team wasn't having much luck against the hoard as their guns were useless. Inside the bar, Kasady tried to control the townspeople, telling Hannah to keep the baby crying, as it helped him think. Carnage arrived with the possessed heroes, telling the Team to get off his lawn. The good guys were quickly tearing through the special forces, making them call Scorn for assistance. She was at the meat packing plant, looking over a large bulldozer. Her symbiote told her to ignore the calls for help and to focus on what she was doing.

Spider-Man rode into town with the townspeople, not sure who were the good and bad guys. At least he knew Doppelganger was a bad guy. The Molotov cocktails scared the symbiotes and Eric went after his wife. As Spider-Man and Carnage fought, a tendril from the symbiote was strangling Hannah inside the bar. Carnage had Spider-Man pinned to the ground, threatening to pull his eyes out of his head when he was hit by a sonic wave. Carnage screamed in pain and Hannah's throat was freed, letting her gasp for air. Agent Venom stood behind Carnage, reporting to base that contact with the mark had been achieved. "Oh, crud. The Punisher is dressed like me," Spider-Man said.

Carnage recognized "Dad" and was soon blasted by a sonic gun and sonic shrapnel. As Carnage began to weaken, his control over the vigilantes began to subside and Agent Venom put his gun in Kasady's mouth. Spider-Man told him to stop and the moment was all it took for his control over Thing and Cap to return. The stranglehold on Hannah returned but Carnage and Agent Venom were immediately hit by the bulldozer driven by Scorn.

Scorn explained over the radio that she had needed time to think and realized that Carnage was the puppet master. To cut his strings, she had to sever Kasady from Carnage. She drove the bulldozer to a giant machine and dumped Carnage and Agent Venom inside. The machine emitted sonics that drove both the Carnage and Venom symbiotes from their hosts, allowing the others to be free of Carnage's influence.

Scorn radioed that the Carnage symbiote was fleeing and confused. Spider-Man asked about the other guy. Inside the machine, Cletus Kasady stood over the dazed Flash Thompson with a shard of glass, asking where his legs had gone.

General Comments

And this is where things really start to fall apart. It's pretty clear that there are too many characters in this story. Scorn really serves very little purpose up to this point. I vaguely remember her being Shriek's therapist in the Carnage series but here she seems to be an engineer, as she works on the bulldozer and the giant dome/sonic machine. She's the one that comes up with the plan to defeat Kasady...using knowledge of his basic weaknesses. Shouldn't that have been Mercury Team's strategy the whole time? Instead, it seems like their plan was to shoot stuff. Of the four mind-controlled heroes, we only see Captain America and the Thing. Funny how Hawkeye and Wolverine of all people seem to be put on the back burner. That must be the first time that's ever happened to Wolverine.

I'm glad to see Spidey get involved. I did like his one liners.

I get the feeling that by this point, Marvel was tired of symbiotes. (Twelve years later, we are still drowning in them.) The artists of the time didn't draw Carnage "right." I hate to be a whiney fanboy but where are Carnage's big white eyes and black aspects of the costume? At times they got it right but it was enough to irk me. The cover art looks right but the inside, not so much. It's still better than the cover art on Deadpool vs Carnage. I thought Carnage's head looked like a big red frog.

//nerd rant

Overall Rating

You can see the wheels starting to come off.