Comic Book Artist and Writer Erik Larsen Reveals Why Venom's Tongue is So Crazy

Most, if not all of us think of Venom’s tongue when we think of the classic Spider-Man villain/anti-hero. His tongue and monstrous teeth have become a defining characteristic of the symbiote and it’s awesome! Erik Larsen, the man who took over for Todd McFarlane on the Spider-Man comics, recently took to Facebook to explain how that tongue came to be. The short answer: he thought he saw it on some art that McFarlane made, but he was mistaken.

Venom will premiere in theaters October 5, 2018. Tom Hardy will play the titular Eddie Brock/Venom.

The untold(?) origin of Venom's tongue.

As you all know, Todd McFarlane was the first guy to draw Venom in the pages of the Amazing Spider-Man and I succeeded him on the title.

Years ago, Todd McFarlane drew a cover for a Spider-Man vs. Venom trade paperback which collected the Spider-Man vs. Venom stories that he had illustrated. On it, he drew Venom with his mouth open and his tongue visible.

I didn't buy the book because I had the individual comics already but my takeaway was that Todd was giving him a tongue now.

Determined to take it a step further, I gave Venom an even bigger, crazier tongue--not realizing that Todd didn't do anything special or unusual with his tongue at all--it was a perfectly ordinary, unremarkable tongue.

For years I'd been given credit for the tongue and I'd sheepishly confess that I got it from Todd from a TPB cover. Imagine my surprise when I actually saw Todd's cover, years later and saw that it looked nothing like I had remembered it! It turned out that I HAD given him that crazy tongue after all!