Our Amazing Friends: Black Suit Debut Creators (Ron Frenz & Tom DeFalco) Discuss Venom #252

Our Amazing Friends: Black Suit Debut Creators (Ron Frenz & Tom DeFalco) Discuss Venom #252

From Amazing Spider-Talk: A Spider-Man Podcast by Dan Gvozden, Mark Ginocchio

February 23, 2026

About this episode

The episode features an interview with Ron Frenz and Tom DeFalco discussing their work on Venom #252 and includes a conversation with Charlie Michael about his book on Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.

This episode opens with our remembrance of artist Sal Buscema, who passed away on January 24, 2026. Then, enjoy a double-sized episode featuring an interview with Ron Frenz and Tom DeFalco about their history with the Venom character and the recent backup story they did for Venom #252 , an “anniversary” celebration of Amazing Spider-Man #252 , which kicked off their run and introduced the world to the black-suited Spider-Man. Then, Dan sits down with Professor Charlie Michael from Emory University’s Film and Media Department. He’s just released the paperback version of his book Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – Youth, Race and the Hypertext , which is an incredible dissection of the film that we are eager to share with our audience. We’ll be doing a follow-up interview with Charlie about the book, but we wanted to give you a chance to read it along with us. You can order a copy of the book here: https://www.routledge.com/Spider-Man-Into-the-Spider-Verse-Youth-Race-and-the-Hypertext/Michael/p/book/9780367764524 Rick Coste edited this episode. Alex Galucki edited the video version of this podcast. Our artwork is handcrafted by artists Ron…

People in this episode

Hosts: Dan Gvozden, Mark Ginocchio

Guests: Ron Frenz, Tom DeFalco, Charlie Michael

Topics covered

  • Venom
  • Spider-Man
  • comic book history
  • interview
  • film analysis
  • anniversary celebration

Keywords

  • Venom
  • Spider-Man
  • Ron Frenz
  • Tom DeFalco
  • Charlie Michael
  • comic books
  • film analysis
  • Sal Buscema

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Emory University

Books & works: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse – Youth, Race and the Hypertext, Venom #252

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