Despite being the final film in the trilogy, 'Venom: The Last Dance' still managed to reveal arguably its greatest villain yet – Knull, the God of the Symbiotes.
If you are a fan of Venom and recently watched Venom: The Last Dance, the post-credit scenes would have got you pretty hyped up about the future of the franchise.
In the scene, we see a looming figure (voiced by Venom: Let There Be Carnage director Andy Serkis) declaring "Your champion has fallen, the King in Black is awake. Your world will burn, and you will watch!"
No matter what may have happened to Venom himself at the end of the movie, it appears as though there could be a future for Marvel’s Symbiotes after all, as the aforementioned post-credit scene teased arguably its biggest villain of all – Knull, the King In Black and God of the Symbiotes!Created by writer Donny Cates and artist Ryan Stegman, Knull made his debut in Venom #3 back in 2018, with his origin story handily explained in the following issue.
Knull made his first appearance in Venom #3 in 2018.
Knull is a primordial being who has been around since the beginning of the universe. Drifting edlessly in the darkness at first, he is awaken when the Celestials decided that his darkness was ‘wanting’, and started to fill it with light.
At first the Celestials offered Knull a, well, job as their ‘King in Black’ who takes care of their creations, but he declines in the most decisive way imaginable – by forging a sword capable of killing a god, and beheading one of the Celestials!
(Fun fact: That Celestial’s head ends up becoming the floating city of Knowhere, as seen in Guardians Of The Galaxy).
It would be great to see the MCU heroes turned into Symbiotes by Knull.
For that ‘crime’, the Celestials decided to banish Knull along with the head of the Celestial he kill. But they made a mistake - instead of sending him somewhere he could not do anymore damage, they sent him deeper into his ‘home’, the Void. There, he used the head of the Celestial as a forge to create the first symbiotes from his own form.
At first, these symbiotes were shaped like swords, and because of the process of their creation in a forge, developed a fear of fire and high-frequency sounds.
Knull was the one who created All Black The Necrosword, the weapon Gorr the God Butcher used in Thor: Love And Thunder.
The first of such swords was the All-Black, or the Necrosword, which MCU fans would recognise as the sword wielded by Gorr the God Butcher in Thor: Love And Thunder.
In the comics, Knull had set out armed with the All-Black the Necrosword to kill all beings in the light, but after one battle, he crashed on an unknown planet, where the then unknown Gorr stole the All Black and later became the God Butcher, who would later go on to battle Thor, or rather, the Jane Foster version of the hero, aka Mighty Thor (As it turns out, this was not the only connection between Thor and Knull).
While stuck on Gorr’s planet, Knull made another discovery - he could use his living abyss power to bond with ‘lesser creatures’ and then manipulate and pilot their new forms as ‘vessels’, even across great distances.
Once he realised his true power, Knull began building his army of symbiotes, with him at the centre as a hive mind.
As is wont to happen in the Marvel universe, Knull’s symbiote army met its match when they decided to attack a primitive, backwater planet called Earth.
It was here that Knull’s symbiote army reached a turning point – Knull had sent his dragon-like ‘Grendels’ to attack a village, who called out for their ‘Beowulf’ hero, but instead, they got the God of Thunder!
Thor’s Mjolnir-born lightning bolt was so powerful that it cut off the symbiotes' connections with Knull. Now free from the hive mind, these symbiotes took on new hosts, and were ‘infected’ with ‘light’ attritbutes like honour, nobility and good. Knull called it an infection, a poison, a.... Venom.
Once they realised how evil Knull really was, millions of symbiotes banded together to imprison him in his own darkness, which came to be known as a planet called Klyntar.
Knull was eventually awakened by, ironically, the same Grendel that had severed his connection to his symbiotes and caused his imprisonment.
After thousands of years, S.H.I.E.L.D. found the Grendel and used pieces of the dragon to create Super ‘Sym-Soldiers’ to fight in the Vietnam War. This process had the unfortunate consequence of reawakening Knull, who took control of the Sym-soldiers. They were later recaptured by Nick Fury and Wolverine, but one of them, Rex, managed to escape.
In the 2018 Venom series, Eddie Brock unknowingly frees the dragon and eventually comes face to face with Knull himself through the dragon’s connection to the hive mind.
This sets into motion events that would have major ramifications through Earth-616, leading to the Absolute Carnage and King in Black events, in which Knull finally invades Earth!
The King In Black event saw Venom working together with Earth's greatest heroes to defeat Knull.
The 2020 crossover event The King In Black begins with a planetwide invasion by Knull and his Grendel dragons, and with a little help from symbiote-possessed Celestials as well!
Hopelessly outmatched and outgunned, the Avengers and X-Men band together to fight back, even enlisting Sentry in a desperate last measure, but it ends up with Knull surrounding the planet with a dark sphere, and turning some of the heroes into symbiote hosts as well.
As it turns out, Knull is actually after Eddie’s son, Dylan, who is apparently a ‘symbiote codex’ who is also a naturally created Human-Symbiote Hybrid (long story short, Knull needs his power).
Eventually, with the combined efforts of Thor, Silver Surfer and Jean Grey, they manage to free the God Of Light (Enigma Force) from Klyntar, who turns Brock into the new Captain Universe!
Brock and Venom later combine to defeat Knull, becoming the new King in Black in the process.
Here's hoping we'll get to see Silver Surfer and his giant sword fighitng Knull in the future.
In case you’re hoping for a crossover between the Venomverse and the MCU, here’s a little tidbit you can latch on to – at one point during Knull’s imprisonment on Klyntar, the Silver Surfer actually landed on the planet when he was still a Herald of Galactus!
Although Knull tried to infect Silver Surfer with his symbiote, the Herald managed to escape thanks to some help from Ego the Living Planet. Silver Surfer also plays a major part in the King In Black series, helping the heroes defeat the villain the finale of the event.
With Galactus and the Silver Surfer also due to enter the MCU in next year’s Fantastic Four: First Steps, one can only hope that Knull might warrant a mention or even a cameo apperance!
