Todd McFarlane Reveals His Honest Opinion Of Pro Wrestlers Using Venom's Image - Exclusive
There's a huge overlap between comics fans and wrestling fans, and it should be no surprise that many wrestlers are comic fans. At the indie level alone, the Venn diagrams overlap enough that wrestling feds like Fantasy Super Cosplay Wrestling –- which works exactly as the name implies –- exist. At the highest levels, specifically WWE and AEW, superhero wrestling gear is increasingly common, and many have taken a special liking to Venom.
Luchador and AEW star Penta El Zero M occasionally wears Venom-inspired masks. WWE Superstar Charlotte Flair wore a Venom frock to the ring during her entrance at Extreme Rules in 2021. Lining up approximately with the release of "Let There Be Carnage," it depicted a symbiote taking over her gear.
The most notable case is Johnny Gargano, who often wears superhero-themed gear and once tweeted that "#Venom has always been one of my favorite [Marvel] characters." Gargano wore Venom-inspired ring gear at NXT TakeOver: Brooklyn 4 in 2018, during his Last Man Standing Match against Tommaso Ciampa. It was thematically appropriate, too: Gargano, having been betrayed and foiled by Ciampa before, needed to blur the line between being a hero and villain to match the vile Ciampa.
Looper recently spoke with Venom co-creator Todd McFarlane, and asked him his thoughts about wrestlers wearing outfits inspired by something he created. His response? Not a ton of surprise.
Leave Aunt May out of this
"Here's what I would say without knowing," McFarlane ventured without any hesitation. "My guess would be that a wrestler wants to be a badass and if you're going to be Aunt May or Venom, I think the choice is really clear. So you just go, 'I'm going for the badass.'" We might argue that Aunt May is plenty badass, especially Marisa Tomei's Aunt May, but that's neither here nor there.
McFarlane continued his reasoning: "Do I want to be the nice, polite hero who's always accommodating and is very courteous? Or do I want to be the guy who from time to time has to bite people's heads off? I don't know. So I get it. Probably if I was a wrestler, I'd be looking for those types of characters too. I'm assuming that characters like Punisher and Wolverine also have a lot of appeal to those same sort of crowds, sort of what we call the anti-heroes."
"Venom: Let There Be Carnage" is now available on digital, 4K UHD, Blu-Ray, and DVD.