Insomniac’s Marvel's: Spider-Man 2 left players with a lot of hanging plot threads for future titles to wrap up: the return of Otto, the surprise appearance of Cindy Moon (AKA the superhero Silk), the cliffhanger with Carnage, Peter’s soft retirement from superheroics, and of course, Norman Osborn’s looming transformation into the Green Goblin. With such a full plate for the third installment, there’s only one chance left for the studio to make good on one of its biggest villain teases from Marvel's Spider-Man 2.

Amid the chaos of Marvel's Spider-Man 2's symbiote invasion, eagle-eyed fans may have noticed the distinctive spiral symbol that appeared on the meteor that brought the invasion to Earth. While this might have slipped past some players, comic readers will have recognized this as the insignia of Knull, a recently created character and the driving force behind the 2020-2021 major crossover event The King in Black.

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Insomniac's Marvel's Spider-Man franchise is packed with transparent tropes and traditions and one is almost guaranteed to be employed again.

Insomniac Has One Chance Left to Feature Knull in its Spider-Man Games

Knull is the creator of the symbiote race. As such, his arrival on Earth would be a major deal; he is not a character that can be relegated to side quests like Tombstone or Chameleon. If Insomniac wants to tackle the King in Black, he needs to be one of the major story threats, if not the main antagonist outright. The problem is, the third and final game in Insomniac's trilogy is already looking a bit overstuffed with characters.

The story of all three games to date has been slowly building toward Norman Osborn’s descent into madness and eventual turn to supervillainy. It seems highly likely that the Green Goblin is the main villain of Marvel’s Spider-Man 3; his story has far too much momentum to fumble in the third act.

Marvel's Spider-Man 3's Plot is Already Too Crowded for Knull

There's also the surprise reveal of Silk/Cindy Moon and the return of Otto Octavius, the main villain from Marvel’s Spider-Man. His deeply personal relationships with Peter and Norman are going to factor heavily into the inevitable drama in Insomniac’s finale. On top of it all, Marvel’s Spider-Man 3 will need to touch on Peter’s retirement from the superhero biz and his inevitable return to web-slinging.

Juggling all these story beats and plot threads means it’s increasingly likely that Insomniac won’t be able to give the eldritch symbiote god the gravitas he demands in a third game in the mainline series. But there is one last place Knull could fit into Insomniac's Spider-Man mythos: the leaked Venom spinoff game.

Knull Could Work as the Main Villain in Insomniac’s Venom Game

Late last year, Insomniac was targeted by hackers who released the studio's upcoming slate of currently unannounced releases. Among them was a Venom standalone game tentatively titled Venom: Lethal Protector. Knull would be much more at home in a game about Venom, as the character was conceived for Venom's own comics. Knull would have to be the main villain, coming to Earth to set his agenda back on course after his previous symbiote invasion was foiled in Marvel’s Spider-Man 2.

Fans who played the last game may balk at the idea and say that Carnage is the obvious contender for a Venom game after The Flame cult questline in Marvel's Spider-Man 2. But Carnage was an acolyte of Knull during The King in Black in the comics and the years-long build up to it. With Cletus already a cult figure in the Flame missions, Carnage acting as a general in Knull’s invasion force would work wonders narratively, allowing for two of Venom’s greatest foes to feature in the character’s anticipated standalone game.

If Insomniac elects to forgo Knull in the Venom game, however, it’s probably best to let sleeping gods lie. The character commands too much narrative attention and too much build-up to waste any precious screen time in Marvel’s Spider-Man 3 on him when the game already has such a long to-do list. Fans have been waiting to see the end of some of these stories since the first game back in 2018. It would be downright criminal to neglect any of them in order to hype up a newly-introduced threat like Knull.