To me, it holds up as a story but not as a Spider-Man story. Its so unconnected with anything that came before or went afterwards concerning Spider-man, Gwen, Peter and Norman. The last time we saw Norman, he was witnessing his drugged out son in a coma and crying. Last time we saw Gwen, she was ... going to Europe? And I don't think Norman and Gwen had ever shared a panel before. Peter and Norman had a long relationship, of course, punctuated by some famous stories. But honestly Norman at this point had been rather inconsistently portrayed between Ditko and Romita. He's a businessman! No wait he's a vengeful sinister psychopath! Oh now he's nuts! But he cares about Harry for some unknown reason now! Then suddenly out of the blue he has Gwen on a bridge and Peter accepts it as if its normal behavior for this guy. Its not. Not even close.

Over time, this all has been interpreted as "Norman upping his game" or him "having mental issues" but its pretty much a bunch of BS. He's just an intriguing character because every time he shows up the writers do something new with him. And at this point, there is no pre-conceived expectation with him whatsoever. Its not like Doc Ock where you absolutely know the guy is going to be arrogant and scientific. No. Norman is always all over the place. And a lot of that is Conway's fault!

And, the story was relatively unconnected with comics that came afterwards. There was mention of it in ASM, for a couple of issues, but barely a mention of it in MTU and PPTSSM. Conway dealt with a follow up, kind of, with the Clone Saga. But was that really dealing with it? The story still just kind of sits there in continuity but almost to big to really play a part. More modern stuff that has occurred is just sentimentality, sometimes misplaced.

Back to the story then. Its great. Hero wins but there is a price. Classic stuff going back to Greek Mythology and earlier. Where it really shines is what impact it had on comics, since it happened with such a high profile character in a young people's comic book. This wasn't some adult magazine or pulp rag, it was mainstream as things can get.

Next we got Frank Miller, Alan Moore and the rest is history.