Welcome to the conclusion of Gimorozo’s exclusive interview with former V.E.N.O.M. leader Miles Mayhem.  Click here if you missed Part 1 of this interview.

Gimorozo: What was it like, competing with other terrorist organizations for toy sales?

MM: Ah, man, it was tough.  I mean there were tons of us out there.  There were the obvious ones like uh the Decepticons; um, whatever Skeletor’s posse was called; there was…man it’s been so long [laughs]

Gimorozo: Cobra

MM: Yeah.  Man, I hate those guys.  Bunch of self-righteous jerks.  You wanna hear a story?  Ok, this is 100% true, man.  You know the AVRs?  [editor's note: Animated Villains Reunion]  Ok, well, they’ve been holding them every couple of years since, I don’t know ‘95, ‘96.  Somewhere around there.  Anyway, you wanna know how many times me, or anyone from V.E.N.O.M.’s been invited?  Guess.  Yeah, none times.

So, at first, I was like, you know, whatever, it’s just a get-together for losers to reminisce.  You know what?  My life’s good, I don’t need that anyway.  I mean, I realize V.E.N.O.M. wasn’t one of the most popular terrorist organizations of the times.  It wasn’t our fault.  I mean, we had to fight Matt Tracker and that bunch of wet blankets–man, what a bunch of punks.  Anyway, I wasn’t too bummed about it.  But then, one night in like ‘04, I was out drinking with Saw Boss and he mentions to me that he got invited to that year’s AVR.  And I’m like, “What?  Saw Boss got invited and I didn’t?”  I mean, seriously, Saw Boss is cool and all, but for him to get invited and not me?  Talk about a slap in the face!  So, I call up Mon*Star and am complaining to him and guess what: he had gotten invited too!  I called, I don’t know, 5 or 6 more bosses from the 80’s and, like, all of them were invited!  So, I’m thinking, ok, my invitation’s in the mail, I’ll get it any day.  Never comes.  I figure, whatever, I’ll show up anyway.  I mean, they all know me, right?  I get there, my name’s not on the list.  I can’t get in.  It took some digging, but after a while I found out why: the AVRs are planned by a standing committee.  Do you know what that means?  A standing committee is permanent, no elections, it’s always these guys.  There’s three people on the committee: Mumm-Ra, Destro, and Serpentor.  Yeah, Cobra’s got the deck stacked in representation.  Who knows how that happened.

Gimorozo: So why wouldn’t Cobra want you there?

MM: Aw, those guys were always mad that I used the name “V.E.N.O.M.”  Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize there was a, uh, a law or something that limits how many terrorist organizations can use poisonous snake based names.  Whatever.  Besides, I came up with that name in like, high school.  I just didn’t copyright it then–didn’t even think about it, y’know?  So then “Cobra”’s a famous name and they claim that “V.E.N.O.M.”’s like, derivative or some nonsense.  And besides that, I didn’t even think of calling it “V.E.N.O.M.”  I thought–I was in English class, ok?  Planning my future–I thought, hey, I’ll start a terrorist organization and call it “Vicious Evil Network of Mayhem,” ok?  It was Andy Tracker, actually, who started calling it “V.E.N.O.M.”  I never would’ve even thought of that!

So, yeah.  If freakin’ Cobra hadn’t spent so much time in litigation with us, they probably would’ve gotten rid of those Joes in no time.  I even offered to help them.  I was like–this was a phone call to Cobra Commander–I said, “Hey, let’s join forces, ok?  We can be ‘Cobra-V.E.N.O.M.’  I’ll help you guys take out the Joes, you help us take out the M.A.S.K. guys.”  And Cobra Commander’s all whiny like a girl and starts, like, yelling at me because I’m using the name V.E.N.O.M. and I just hung up on him.  That guy is such a tool.  We really could of helped too.  I mean, my freakin’ helicopter could turn into a jet!  What could Cobra’s weapons do?  Nothing, they sucked!  Ugh, that stuff still pisses me off.

And, hey, just so you know something about Destro: it’s a mask.  That’s not his real head.  I don’t even know why he wears that stupid thing; it’s not like it’s cool or anything.  I think it was just to try and one-up Cobra Commander–who is totally normal-looking, by the way.  No need for the mask.  My mask?  It shot freakin’ acid.  Man, I hate those guys!

So concludes our exclusive interview.  Good bye.

Welcome to the first half of our exclusive, two-part interview with Miles Mayhem, the notorious terrorist leader of V.E.N.O.M.  We caught up with Mister Mayhem at the office of his currenet project, CoiNebula.

Gimorozo: Good evening, Mister Mayhem.  It’s been 20 years since the dissolution of V.E.N.O.M., what have you been up to since then?

Miles Mayhem: Well, let’s see…I got back into real estate immediately following that; I did that for maybe ten or twelve years here in Lincoln, Nebraska.  I liked that alright, but you know what?  I always wanted to be my own boss.  I missed those days where I was the leader of a terrorist organization.  I made my own hours, took vacation days when I wanted, it was great.  So, after a couple of years of putting together a business plan and getting some investors, I quit my real estate job and started my own company.  It’s called CoiNebula.  You’ve probably seen our machines in your local grocery store or wherever.  Anyway, it’s–what you do is, you take all that loose change you acquire, right?  Well, you take all that and you dump it into one of our machines and it gives you back the money, but in different coins!  So, like for example: you have three quarters and a nickel, ok?  Right?  Well, you put that in and it’ll give you–I don’t know–five dimes, eight pennies and a different nickel.

Gimorozo: But that’s only 63 cents…and you put in 80 cents, right?

MM: Right, but, c’mon, we gotta make money.  So, that’s a, uh, a “service fee” or whatever.  Anyway, it’s not been doing that great lately.  The economy and all.  The pay was a lot better with V.E.N.O.M., but I have good dental now.  That was one thing I learned, man.  When I started V.E.N.O.M., we were all young and crazy, so we didn’t have health insurance, right?  Who needed it?  We didn’t have, uh, 401ks.  We didn’t have matching uniforms.  None of that stuff that a good company should, y’know?  So when I started CoiNebula I was like, “this time, I’m doing it right,” y’know?  “This time, I’m living the high life.”  So, I got all that stuff.  Life’s good.  It is.

Gimorozo: You bring up V.E.N.O.M.  What was it like to be in the middle of the 80’s 30-minute long animated toy commercial scene?  That must have been something.

MM: Yeah, I mean, it was really cool sometimes.  But other times, it was a pain.  For example, I had all these great plots to take out M.A.S.K. and all, but I always had to cut it down to 30 minutes.  Actually, not even, it’s only 22 minutes if you count commercials!  Which was something that always irritated the fire out me: we were nothing but a commercial to sell action figures, but we still had to take commercial breaks.  Seriously?

But, anyway, 22 minutes to somehow execute an evil plot.  You can’t work under those conditions but so long before it really starts to get to you.  And the other thing that really pissed me off was that I wasn’t allowed to kill any of the good guys.  Now, you tell me how I’m supposed to take over the world without killing the people opposing me?  Ain’t gonna happen.  It’s just not.  And besides that, I never really wanted to take over the world, I would have been totally content with being the despotic leader of some third-world country.  But no, the writers always insisted that I try to take over the world.  In 22 minutes.  Without killing anybody.  Morons.

Check back later in the week for the conclusion of this riveting interview with former V.E.N.O.M. boss, Miles Mayhem where he discusses other 80’s cartoon bad guys.