The anticipation leading to the inevitable reawakening and arrival of Donny Cates and Ryan Stegman’s terrifying rendition of Knull has been steadily rising ever since the former Venom symbiote known as Eddie Brock told his son about the symbiote god creator's chilling history in Absolute Carnage. At the time, it seemed as though the Marvel universe would soon fall victim to the god of the symbiotes’ unquenchable thirst for destruction. That unforgettable comic cell in Absolute Carnage #5 depicting Knull riding away from his prison on top of a massive symbiote demon monstrosity made it appear as though it could happen at any moment. But that was all the way back in November. It’s been a long year, especially for Eddie who’s known about Knull’s escape ever since he was forced to release the creator-god in the series' final installment. But Knull will finally emerge from the darkness in the upcoming series, King in Black: Planet of the Symbiotes.
In Cates and Stegman's retelling, Knull may have created the symbiotes (who are inherently violent themselves), but his creations actually felt compelled by their god’s inexorable quest for bloodshed to cage him. The sheer volume of symbiotes who were inspired to partake in this endeavor was so great that many erroneously believed that these creatures trapped Knull within a planet when, in fact, it was just billions of their bodies layered on top of each other in such a way that their amalgamated mass matched the outward appearance of a planet.
Throughout the Absolute Carnage series, the mentally deranged serial killer Cletus Kasady is known as Carnage utilized the demonic Grendel symbiote with the iconic exposed spine to bring back Knull, and the manner by which Carnage carried out this venture made his endeavor all the more ominous. All he had to do was extract symbiote matter known as a Codex from the body of every host who had ever bonded with a symbiote. The original purpose of these Codices was to transmit messages about the host to the symbiote hive even after the symbiote left the body. But for Carnage, their purpose was to free his god, for it was said that whoever collected every Codex could communicate with the hive and awaken their god-creator. And since every Codex is infused in the DNA of each host, its extraction will lead to most certain death. This made his quest all the more enjoyable for Carnage.
While gory in and of itself, the anticipation grew exponentially every time Carnage would reference a sensory action that his god regained throughout Absolute Carnage, such as the chilling query, “Can you hear him breathing? He’s almost awake.” It's almost worse when Eddie later says, “I can see him in his cage. He can hear us.”
The upcoming King in Black series will also put the symbiote Scream center stage, a most welcome addition, as the symbiote’s complicated relationship with her host Andrea "Andi" Benton has made their journey the most compelling of the symbiotes who the Life Foundation forced the Venom symbiote to give birth to earlier on. Remember, it was Scream who originally bonded with mercenary suffering from schizophrenia that Knull later reanimated upon the mercenary’s death.
Lastly, the series is said to continue where the riveting yet haunting Ravencroft series left off. Although the unwanted vampiric test subjects of earlier iterations of Ravencroft were defeated (and are being experimented upon once again), the series ended with a Church of the New Darkness member opening a hidden chamber containing the tomb of Carnage’s ancestor, Cortland Kasady. The cult's purpose is clear: to resurrect him. Best of all, the sinister history of Ravencroft, dating all the way back to when the land was ruled by an overly voracious cannibalistic cult, will undoubtedly continue to unravel in King in Black as Knull brings chaos in his wake.