Apparently, Spider-Man won’t be the only one having a homecoming this year. 

Marvel just released a preview image promising the restoration of the Spiderverse’s favorite power couple: Eddie Brock reclaims his original mantle as the vicious vigilante Venom. Set for a return this April, little else is known about the character’s return at this time, save that the current Venom team of Mike Costa and Gerardo Sandoval will still be at the helm. 

With the benefit of hindsight, it’s easy to see that Marvel’s been preparing us for this epic return. There will be a series of Venom-themed variants available in March, featuring the stars of their respective titles mutated by their own symbiote costumes. Marvel had also teased a super-sized Venom #150 to celebrate one-hundred fifty (not at all consecutive) issues starring one or another incarnation of the black-suited bad boy. 

It’s almost hard to believe that it’s been over a decade since Eddie Brock ceased being the alien costume’s host, having been driven into irreconcilable conflict with it in Paul Jenkins’ “The Hunger” story arc, and finally splitting with it in Mark Millar’s Marvel Knights: Spider-Man. Even before that, Venom only had sporadic appearances in the prior decade of Spider-Man titles, mostly confined to his own series since 1993’s Venom: Lethal Protector. 

After their breakup, Eddie Brock was unwittingly manipulated and transformed by Mr. Negative, becoming the erratic Anti-Venom. He gave up these abilities to help cure the Spider Queen’s plague in “Spider Island”, before being manipulated by another mysterious gangster, the Crime Master, into becoming the newest incarnation of Toxin. He’s currently one of the trump cards in the anti-Carnage task force chasing Cletus Kassidy and the Darkhold down in Carnage, although that book is nearing its conclusion.

The alien, meanwhile, has since bonded to Angelo Fortunato, Mac Gargan, Carol Danvers, the Red Hulk and the Spirit of Vengeance simultaneously, all the Guardians of the Galaxy individually, and Flash Thompson. It’s currently forced into an uneasy bond with ambitious criminal Lee Price, although the symbiote’s time with Flash Thompson has increased its autonomy and taught it nobility, bringing their alliance into constant conflict. 

So really, they  both handled the break-up pretty well. Hopefully, their reunion this April will prove to be just as much of a wild ride.