The similarities between Ghost Rider and Venom are apparent to every Marvel fan as both involve an otherworldly presence inhabiting a human host and giving that host extraordinary powers. While those similarities are well noted, the initial personalities of the Spirit of Vengeance and Venom couldn’t be more different as Ghost Rider’s Earthly mission was to punish the guilty and Venom’s was to create chaos for innocent people surrounding Spider-Man. While initially opposites, Ghost Rider and Venom become much more similar as they both express the same level of separation anxiety in regard to their respective hosts, proving Ghost Rider is truly the ‘Venom’ of hell.
In the comic series Ghost Rider/Blaze: Spirits of Vengeance by Howard Mackie and Adam Kubert, the Spirit of Vengeance has been separated from Johnny Blaze and they each get their own physical form rather than having to share one body. Instead of Ghost Rider returning to the dimension from which it came, the demon decides to stick around and becomes Blaze’s partner. The two then work together to battle the evils of the world, though they have no binding obligation to do so as they once did.
Similar to the situation Ghost Rider and Johnny Blaze were in, Eddie Brock and the Venom symbiote parted ways in Venom #11 by Donny Cates and Ryan Stegman. In that issue, Eddie Brock casts Venom out of his body after Brock learns that the symbiote was tampering with his memories in order to remain a part of him. Instead of finding another host, the Venom symbiote creates his own body, that of a person in a grey hoodie, and follows Eddie around until he needs him. While Venom’s situation isn’t that of a mutual partnership between two entities that were once one, it does carry the same level of dependence on the part of the otherworldly entity, a dependence in both that replaced their former apathy.
During their time bonded to each other, Ghost Rider formed a connection with Johnny that the spirit didn’t want to give up once they no longer shared a body. Venom was the same way, refusing to leave Eddie’s side even when he so clearly wasn’t wanted instead of simply leaving the host and finding another. Ghost Rider and Venom were created through randomly fusing with a human host just as they both had done before, but this time they formed an emotional connection with that host so when the time came to part ways, both otherworldly forces refused to do so in almost exactly the same manner.
When the Venom symbiote first bonded to Eddie Brock, it was fueled with hatred over Spider-Man’s betrayal and didn’t care at all about its new host and only wanted to create violence and chaos in Spider-Man’s life in part by threatening the innocent, exhibiting the exact opposite personality traits as Ghost Rider. When Ghost Rider was first formed, the Spirit of Vengeance merely used its new host to breach into the physical world to do what it was created for, punishing the guilty and collecting souls for hell. Because the Spirit of Vengeance formed an emotional bond with his host and continued to be a part of his life after their physical bond was broken just as Venom had done, Ghost Rider and Venom’s personalities became much more similar and showed that Ghost Rider is the ‘Venom’ of hell.