Venom has one of the most tragic backstories in comic books, with Eddie Brock bonding with the Venom symbiote on the night that he was set to commit suicide. However, in the 90s, the Venom character started becoming slightly goofier, as Eddie Brock began to work for the US Government and eat chocolate to curb his flesh-eating tendencies. However, one of the goofiest things Venom did in the 90s was to disguise himself as a nun in the Bronx while protecting a South American leader.
In Sign of the Boss, Venom is given a new mission by the Government of the United States. Eddie Brock is tasked with protecting a South American leader (Franco Santera) who is giving a speech in a church in the Bronx. Venom is tasked to protect the leader from the shadows, as the US Government doesn’t want to be seen to hold a close association with the controversial leader. The comic cuts to show the visiting leader giving the speech at the church, however, Venom isn’t the only important Marvel character in attendance, then-Ghost Rider, Danny Ketch is also in attendance at the speech.
Naturally, as Venom is a gruesome-looking monster, he can hardly just attend the speech in his normal form. Although, for whatever reason, Venom decides that the best disguise for the situation is as a nun. Not just any nun, however, a seven-foot nun known as Sister Edwina, with muscles upon muscles. Venom doesn’t have to wait long before violence breaks out. Members of the crowd begin shooting weapons, angered at Sentera’s words considering his dubious past in South America. This crowd commotion ends up knocking out Danny Ketch. A villain called Teraknid (who is half robot, half spider) tries to attack the visiting leader, but the leader’s own personal bodyguard, known as Stigmata, falls in to defend her boss. During a brief fight, Teraknid poisons Stigmata with his venomous sting and she is knocked unconscious. This is where Venom jumps in, attacking the gunmen before working his way towards Teraknid.
Venom defeats Teraknid relatively quickly, but Ghost Rider soon appears and after a misunderstanding, a fight breaks out between Venom and Ghost Rider, with the latter even threatening to give Venom the penance stare. Venom is able to convince Ghost Rider that he’s changing his ways and working for the government now, which Danny Ketch appears to accept as the two fight together to defeat the remaining villains, with Ketch even giving the penance stare to the Franco Santera, after it was revealed that the attack on his life was orchestrated by the leader himself as a PR stunt and then tried to kill the witnesses after this broke out.
This comic book is far from the best Venom story of all time. It features one of the most ridiculous villains of all time in Teraknid, and even has one of the worst Ghost Rider costumes of all time too. That being said, at least we got to see Venom’s insane nun disguise.