Marvel Goes Full ‘Evangelion’ With New Venom Nod

Marvel seems to have taken some inspiration from the anime world this month, as Edge of Spider-Geddon #2 features a mech suit conspicuously reminiscent of Neon Genesis Evangelion.

Warning! Spoilers for Edge of Spider-Geddon #2 lie ahead!

The Spider-Verse has come to include all kinds of different web-slinging heroes with all kinds of different powers, including Peni Parker. Peni co-pilots a giant mech suit, helped along by a familiar genetically-engineered radioactive spider. She was first introduced in 2014, but this week she returned in the pages of Edge of Spider-Geddon #2, with a notable anime similarity.

While Peni pilots a suit called SP//dr, her superiors introduce another suit called Ven#m. This mech is a dead ringer for the giant fighting robots from Evangelion. If that were not enough, the similarity becomes even more striking in the heat of battle, as the Ven#m suit takes over its pilot, Addy, and sprouts tentacles and long, snake-like tongue.

Rather than a genetically engineered spider, the Ven#m suit is run on something called a Sym Engine — which is slowly revealed to be similar to Marvel’s familiar Symbiote. This issue makes an intriguing read for anyone familiar with the Venom mythology or mech series like Evangelion, and an especially gratifying read for followers of both.

Edge of Spider-Geddon #2 was written by Gerard Way, Lonnie Nadler and Zac Thompson, and was illustrated by Alberto Jimenez Alburquerque. Way has a well-documented love for anime, while Nadler, Thompson and Alburquerque all retweeted articles about Ven#m’s apparent Evangelion influence this week. Thompson, in particular, seemed excited by the comparison, jumping into the replies to chat with fans.

“All about that EVA Venom,” he wrote.

Two more issues of Edge of Spider-Geddon are on the way, both in November of 2018. The events will lead right into Spider-Geddon itself, the big sequel to 2014’s Spider-Verse event. The main event is expected to kick off in February of 2019.

Meanwhile, Evangelion are still waiting on the third installment of the Rebuild of Evangelion film series. It is still slated for a 2020 release, though there is time for things to move around a lot between now and then.

At the same time, fans are still crying out for a live-action adaptation of the franchise. In a world where Pacific Rim managed a massive sequel, many see no reason why Evangelion cannot work instead. The project has been whispered about in early development stages a few times since 2003, but nothing concrete is in the works.