Venom: The Savage Six is the end of Rick Remender's stint writing Flash Thompson's - aka "Agent Venom" - adventures, and the beginning of Cullen Bunn's. In fact, the two of them co-write issues 18-21, which form the actual "Savage Six" portion of the trade.
The three issues prior to that revolve around Flash having been drafted into the "Secret Avengers", which Remender was taking over as writer from Warren Ellis. Flash trying to adjust to being on a team with Captain America (until Hawkeye takes over as leader), putting his foot in his mouth around Valkyrie, and having a whole other set of people to lie to about the fact the new Crime-Master knows who's wearing the symbiote. All of which also means more lying to his mother, his now ex-girlfriend Betty Brant, and his pal Peter Parker.
The Savage Six story itself is mostly Flash scrambling to protect his mother, sister and Betty from the fairly random assortment of villains the Crime-Master assembled. There's the Jack O'Lantern Remender and Tony Moore introduced in this series, but also The Fly, Death Adder from the Serpent Society(?), some digitized goof called Megatak, and the Toxin symbiote, bonded to Eddie Brock. It's not a great team since I'm not sure what history Flash has with Death Adder or Megatak. There's no meat to their presence, they're just here to make numbers.
At least two of those are Flash's own fault, as the Fly plays him with some sob story about a kid so that Flash lets him escape custody in issue 16. As for Brock, he was going around trying to kill all the symbiotes, and messed up Flash's attempt to put a bullet in Crime-Master's skull. Flash had to bail, and let Eddie webbed up to another symbiote bonded to him.
Flash ends up pulling the Fly's wings off, while Flash's mom watches, while Brock goes up like oil fire along with the symbiote because Flash can't pull him free in time. Not sure what point to draw from that. He showed mercy to one guy, and that guy turned around and tried to kill him. He left Brock to the wolves, then fucked up saving him.
Maybe the conclusion is Flash sucks at this. The last issue in the trade is his final showdown with Jack O'Lantern, who went ahead and stole Flash's dad's corpse as a taunt. How convenient Flash spends the entire issue thinking about his abusive drunk of a dad, and how similar they are.
Artist-wise, this collection is a mess. I know, no big surprise from Marvel in the early 2010s. Lan Medina draws issues 15 and 18-21, with Robert Atkins handling some pages in issue 20. Declan Shalvey draws issue 22. Kev Walker draws issues 16 and 17. There's 7 inkers, including Shalvey inking himself, and Walker doing likewise, but only on issue 16. There's 3 separate colorists, and no, they don't correspond to the primary artists, as Chris Sotomayor handles issues 16-21. There's even two different letterers!
Of the various art teams, the Shalvey/Lee Loughridge pairing is probably the best for setting mood. Shalvey sticks to a lot of wide, short panels, and more than the other artists, remembers the way the symbiote looks when Flash wears it is just something he's making it do. So as Flash loses control or gets angry, spikes start to protrude from it, and there are panels where you can see it's shifting more towards its classic appearance. And Loughridge drenches panels in a particular shade, playing up melancholy or fury.
Walker's art has rougher texture, and he tends to illustrate the violence more vividly than Medina or Shalvey. He likes tilted panels with rough-edged borders, although at times it's difficult to tell if I'm supposed to read across two pages or finish one then move to the next. Either way, the more graphic approach feels like a good choice; this is Venom, not Spider-Man. What's more, it's a Venom desperate to fix his earlier mistakes, proves he's not a fuck-up who lets people down all the time.
Comparatively, Medina's work is cleaner, more straightforward. Easy to read and tell what's happening, but kind of flat next to the others. Walker's Flash looks tired, eyes narrowed, face pinched, and he's not even scrambling to keep people alive yet. Medina's looks way too clean for someone already beat up and allegedly feeling a lot of pressure.
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