Marvel Legends 85th Anniversary Venom review

We haven’t lacked for Marvel Legends Venom figures, but I was definitely interested in grabbing the 85th Anniversary Venom. It looked big and imposing with even better articulation than my most recent Venom pickup — the BAF Absorbing Man version. That’s held up pretty well against a bunch of contenders, but this one looks poised to knock it from the top spot.

Let’s see if this 85th Anniversary Venom is the new king in black on my Spider-Man villains shelf or another close, but not quite definitive.

Packaging: There’s an interesting note with this Venom figure. He’s on the retro card Spider-Man Animated Series setup but also gets a sticker signaling this is another addition to the 85th Anniversary series. In the end it doesn’t matter. The retro card packaging is cool. I love the mix of the yellow and red logo against the purple background and the orange/red box showcasing Venom.

Over on the back, it’s the same as always with that vintage artwork showing the various accessories and another box with a bio. It’s funny how succinct these retro card bios are yet they contain all the essential character information.

Likeness: One thing that stands out with the 85th Anniversary Venom is he immediately looks formidable like how massive and imposing Todd McFarlane initially drew him. The BAF Absorbing Man figure used the Hyperion mold, which was arguably a better fit for Venom than Hype.

This one uses the updated Omega Red mold and is just all-around superior body with better proportions and musculature.

It was swappable parts in these places, but let’s start with the defaults. 85th Anniversary Venom’s head is the extended, swirling tongue version that became synonymous with the character. I tend to appreciate the more maniacal toothy grin McFarlane gave Venom. The tongue seemed a little goofy and made for an opening for Spider-Man’s webbing.

Fortunately, that version is also included. The teeth aren’t as small as the BAF version making the smile look less insidious, but it’s still eerie. The furrowed brow helps give those eye sockets and extra level of menace and depth. After this shoot this will be my default Venom head.

He’s also got dynamically posed claw hands that’s all set to choke out Spidey or palm someone’s head just to be creepy.

Scale: Venom is a character whose scale has varied greatly over the years. It seems like the best measurement is that Spider-Man should come up to Venom’s mouth. He’s more linebacker height to Peter’s wide receiver frame than a 7-footer next to Spidey. The 85th Anniversary Venom is scaled accurately to more traditional portrayals of Venom.

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Paint: There’s always that challenge of putting white onto black plastic. If there’s not enough paint applications, the black will bleed through. There are some elements of the logo that have some transparency and it just seems like an unavoidable issue for mass market release figures. Fortunately, the paint apps are clean without any caked-up areas of white paint.

The head sculpts turned out nicely with clean hits to the teeth and gum lines. Venom’s eyesas if the figure got fiddled with at some part during the construction/paint process. Black and white is always a tricky combination due to the difficulties in applying the white thick enough that the black doesn’t bleed through.

Articulation: By far this is the most articulated Venom figure we’ve gotten from Marvel Legends. The King in Black and Venom three-pack figures (both on Amazon) have introduced more articulation for Venom, but this one is even better.

It’s got the butterfly shoulders, which adds so much more character and implied power to Venom while introducing the tilting abdomen joint.

This gives Venom much more poseability allowing him to hit a variety of crazy symbiote-enhanced stances.

The biggest issue with Venom is the choice of neck articulation. Hasbro has been using dumbell neck joints instead of the hinge joint they’ve used for years. It significantly reduces the range of movement, which could be addressed by creating more space in the neck peg area. This is fixable with a Dremel or Xacto knife.

85th Anniversary Venom has:

• neck
• ball jointed shoulders
• bicep
• elbows (hinge and swivel)
• wrist (hinge and swivel)
• abdomen (tilting)
• torso
• waist
• thighs
• hips
• knees (double-jointed)
• shin
• ankle

Accessories: Venom typically has a similar accessory rollout. The 85th Anniversary Venom is no different.

He’s got the alternate head that I already mentioned as well as a set of swappable fists. That’s great for when Venom gets into a punching battle with Spider-Man though I do prefer the claw hands for when he’s trying to throttle poor Peter.

Worth it? The 85th Anniversary Venom is an exclusive, but didn’t get any silly mark up. He was $25 like the other regular figures. That’s a good thing since he doesn’t have some unique accessory rollout to warrant a higher price point.

Rating: 9.5 out of 10

The neck joint does create some articulation limitations, but the 85th Anniversary Venom is easily the best version of the character we’ve gotten from Marvel Legends so far.

Where to get it?  The 85th Anniversary Venom is exclusive to Wal-Mart. You can get him right now from Walmart.com.