The Green Goblin is in an all-out war with Dr. Octopus, and he’s kicking the snot out of the ex(?)-villain who has usurped the body of our favorite wall-crawler, illustrating quite clearly that he’s not the Superior Spider-Man he thinks he is.
The “Goblin Nation” story arc dontinues in Superior Spider-Man #29, as the Green Goblin continues to destroy the life that Otto Octavius has created out of the ruins of Peter Parker’s life, out of a sense of jealousy and anger that Otto was the one who actually killed Spider-Man, robbing Norman Osborn of that triumph. Well, we think he’s Norman Osborn. He’s certainly acting the part, he’s got the glider-scar on his chest, and he has already claimed to be, but there has to be a reason why we haven’t seen his face beneath the mask yet. Then again, at this point, watching Spider-Man’s #1 enemy deliver brutally harsh lessons to his #2 enemy trying to take the #1 slot has been so impressive that we’ll be disappointed if there’s some kind of swerve and this isn’t Norman. So we’ll assume it is.
The Goblin knows everything about what Otto has done, living in Spider-Man’s mind, and everything about Otto’s technology, especially how to subvert it and bend it to his own will. The only thing Goblin doesn’t know is the man under the mask but above the brain is Peter Parker. In fact, this issue opens with Goblin presuming Parker dead, when in actuality, he’s trying to cure Carlie Cooper of the Goblin Serum infection that has turned her into a thing he calls Monster. The Goblin Nation Army is laying siege to New York, out in the open, monopolizing the Avengers and every obscure hero in town, because that’s what Otto’s war on crime has done – consolidated power with Osborn.
Now, the time has come for the coup de grace, drawing Spider-Man out of hiding, destroying everything that ever meant anything to Otto Octavius as well as everything he’s built as Spider-Man in one fell swoop to completely demoralize him, then taunting him with special hostages to keep him desperate. It’s a great moment when Otto is at a complete loss, saying “I’ve never been on this side of the equation before” and actually asking himself what Parker would do – and Parker can’t respond, because the spectre of his consciousness is busy being swallowed up in the hate-filled life story of Doc Ock.
Another great moment from Christos Gage, who is scripting from Dan Slott’s plot, comes when Otto comes face to face with Norman, who is brandishing one of his hostages – one Don “The Schnoz” Lamaze, Otto’s old classmate who later became Parker’s snide teacher, and Otto’s response is to laugh at Norman’s choice. That illustrates a clear difference between he and Parker, which the disappointed Norman quickly realizes, which makes this entire conflict that much more interesting and fresh. We always dig it when villains fight each other, and this time, one of them is wearing the skin of a hero, and it’s fascinating – especially when the joke character of Lamaze makes a surprising sacrifice play to save Spider-Man’s life, which makes for an incredibly potent reminder of what Otto was and who he’s aspiring to be, making an emotional gut-punch out of his earlier derision.
This is another exciting issue in this amazingly invigorating Spider-Man era, as there are so many plot irons in the fire that you can actually feel Otto getting overwhelmed by it all even before Mayor J. Jonah Jameson unleashes the Spider-Slayers and gets Spider-Man 2099 involved. While not quite Humberto Ramos (who is?), Giuseppe Camuncoli is doing gangbusters work on the art side, bringing forth the sheer menace of the Green Goblin in ways that bring to mind the Joker (let’s face it, they’ve got a lot in common), although Gage and Slott are keeping his attitude grounded, measured, and less manic than the Clown Prince of Crime.
Superior Spider-Man has been a highly compelling work, but its time runs short, so cherish what we have left.
