It should’ve been Harry…as then you could have a legitimate redemption with past sins haunting rather than literal evil blasted out… instead they doubled down on Harry while making Norman have positive relationships he never had.
It should’ve been Harry…as then you could have a legitimate redemption with past sins haunting rather than literal evil blasted out… instead they doubled down on Harry while making Norman have positive relationships he never had.
The voice for Peter took a little getting used to me too (especially when you have Dr Strange and Tony and Magik who just feel so authentic) but it does fit the version of Spider-Man they’re using. I find myself just playing to see what the different characters say to each other.
I don't think Wells wanted the reader to think it was temporary. It was almost played up as a twist/shock that it happened. And up to that point, Peter warming up to him was played straight.
From the general audience's POV, Norman is arguably Marvel's Lex Luthor. Arguably more people know Norman than they know Hammer and Roxxon (and even Fisk). If for no other reason than being the archenemy of Marvel's mascot and getting tons of exposure in adaptations.
Stuff like Marvel Knights, Dark Reign and Evil Incarcerated elevates him too IMO.
In any case, he is up there. Definitely in the top 5 most iconic corporate tycoons in Marvel's world. And it's just in poor taste to argue someone like that deserves a second chance. (Not unless you go ahead and make that argument for every other villain that isn't a rich corporate dude - and that's just not realistic).
Last edited by Kaitou D. Kid; 12-20-2023 at 02:13 PM.
Yes, but the most high profile of those adaptations - William Dafoe - makes him out to be basically a case of double personality brought on by the goblin formula. It's a bit ambiguous in Raimi's original film, but there's no two ways about it in No Way Home.
As I say, Norman Osborn is a decent way to explore toxic masculinity and patriarchy. He's much less suited to stories about corporate greed because his evil isn't really about enabling the corporate bottom line - it may have been faintly in his origin story but that ship has now sailed. As a villain he's now basically Marvel's worst case of Joker syndrome - the villain whose main motivation is their desire to hurt the hero.
Petrus Maria Johannaque sunt nubendi
Gold Goblin truly was excellent. Christopher Cantwell excels at characterization.
But the current ASM run has wasted all the story potential with lilttle to no grasp of Norman's character or anything to say about him other than "Me once bad, now me good, oops, me might be bad again, LOL." The concept of sins and what effect their removal has had on Norman have been poorly defined and seem to change from issue to issue as the run needs them to change, rather than integrating them organically into the story and using them as a theme. The relationship with Peter is also cliche and thin, providing little to no suspension of disbelief for the reader, with both characters ignoring their actual long history and substituting a glib Raimi-verse reference instead.
So to answer the original questions: I like the idea of Norman as a good guy, it could be a very affecting story and even a tragic one. But is the current story in ASM a good arc? LOL no.
“I always figured if I were a superhero, there’s no way on God's earth that I'm gonna pal around with some teenager."
— Stan Lee
I don't like the desire to hurt the hero as a motivation (*). The nature of superhero stories means that heroes tend to be reactive rather than proactive, and having the villain's motivation be to harm the hero only exacerbates that. At best, it makes the hero's involvement in the event purely self-interested rather than altruistic - a hero should be helping other people not saving themselves. At worst, it means that the hero would be making the world a better place by retiring and so taking away the villain's motivation.
(*) The X-Men are a partial exception, as when anti-mutant villains are out to get them it's not personal and also because they're implicitly the first line of defence for all the other mutants out there. Even then I prefer seeing the X-Men actively infering with villains' plans, rather than being reactive targets.
Petrus Maria Johannaque sunt nubendi
Well yeah you can’t get a shock or emotions if you don’t at least build and commit to the relationship. But the hints were always there that this was coming. Plus it’s the nature of the medium so even if it wasn’t spelt out we knew Norman would go back goblin eventually cause that’s how these things work.
To an extent, it's true that Dafoe's take casts a shadow on everything. But that has more to do with how much the live-action movies shadowbox Raimi and can't move past those first two films (as much as they pretend not to). I would say it goes beyond Norman there, IMO. General audiences to an extent still think of Maguire and Dunst when they think Spidey and Mary Jane.
But I wouldn't say the ship has sailed. I think all of that is slowly going away, and will probably go away fully when we get a reboot that matches Raimi's the way Nolan's matched Burton's.
Outside of the live-action films, Norman in the comics since the mid 2000s (starting with Thunderbolts/Marvel Knights to Dark Reign and all the way up to Spencer's run/Evil Incarcerated) has gone back to having other intentions besides just Spider-Man. Insomniac Norman (while more sympathethic) is very much a metaphor for corporate greed in the first game. And there's also Spectacular, which goes without saying. Heck, even the two Disney cartoons... as bad as they were, they did a lot of that corporate stuff, didn't they? As did the Ultimate comics and the TASM films (everyone joked how cliche they got that all the villains came from Oscorp).
The hints were there in the sense that they were subtle enough you can overlook them. Which proves my point that Wells wanted us to be shocked/surprised/feel tragic about it when it happens, but it doesn't work because it's Norman.
Last edited by Kaitou D. Kid; 12-21-2023 at 02:00 PM.
So problem with that is pacing of the turn. In the sins arc we get Norman suddenly afraid when he cackles and then in the following arc when it hasn't even been established at all that he got his sins back we have a completly different acting Norman. There may have been one instance in the very beginning from him being sorta of mean to Peter, but that was to get him out of the apartment. To him suddenly acting like his old self without proper buildup. It just happens which deflates the whole setup
IIRC, in the scene where Norman cackles, the narration said the sins returned home (to Norman) and not the spear, so it was established.
Wıthin the established logic of the story, Peter with Norman's sins started acting like a complete pycho right after receiving them, so it is internally consistent that Norman would also have a quick personality change. If anything, it is taking him a while becoming Green Goblin again considering how instantenious Peter's transformation was.
From a storytelling perspective however, I can understand the complaints about the lack of proper buildup.
Last edited by Ubauba01; 12-21-2023 at 10:48 AM.
Asking for this run to respect the reader and deliver story consistency, characterization and plot structure with internal integrity is like asking for green cheese crumbles from the Moon on your salad. Everything is nonsense, story beats appearing pulled without much rhyme or reason.
“I always figured if I were a superhero, there’s no way on God's earth that I'm gonna pal around with some teenager."
— Stan Lee