spiderman

Harry Osborn’s Comic Appearances: Amazing Spider-Man #41 – 43 (1966)

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Well the awfulness of the current comics shows no sign of going away anytime soon, so let’s jump back into this! Where we left off, Harry’s father had just overcome his first bout of supervillainy, but it would be faaaaaar from the last.

Here’s Harry’s very brief appearance in #41. Looks like his school bully days are behind him thanks to the previous story’s events! Meanwhile, Peter’s getting interested in Gwen.

#42 shows Harry defending Peter to Flash! Hooray for character development! Also Peter loves his motorbike a little too much.

Harry and Gwen’s relationship is a bit hard to pin down during this point, are they actually dating in the non-exclusive way or just friends?

And here’s Harry’s last appearance in these three comics. You’ll note that once more he sticks up for Peter. But now we’ve turned a corner into the real world and a still very relevant era of American history, the Vietnam war. Now I admit I don’t know much about it, being neither American or Vietnamese, but I know the basics. Flash has already been drafted, and these three panels rather make it sound like Harry is distressed at the possibility of Peter too being made to go to war.

Stan Lee’s thoughts about Vietnam I don’t actually know, but I’m gonna see if I can find out before the next one of these posts. I’d be interested in that. Harry is absolutely correct here in that a young man forced to join the military and kill people in a war is nothing remotely humorous.

My Harry Osborn article for the Mary Sue

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Nick Spencer’s New Spider-Man Twist Literally Demonizes The Mentally Ill

I’m very pleased to announce I just got an article about Spider-Man, Harry Osborn and mental illness published at The Mary Sue! It’s, uh, not positive about Nick Spencer’s writing.

I hope you enjoy it. There are some nice comments on there, including one that actually vocalised something I’ve been thinking for a while – for all the terribleness of this storyline, the backlash to it did highlight how unexpectedly beloved Harry is among Spider-Man fans. (Maybe the real Harry was the friends we made along the way.)

the new disney announcements

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…Or that’s how it felt? Like my first thoughts weren’t “Wow a load of new toys!” but “How the hell am I meant to find time to watch THAT MUCH STUFF, especially if I want to keep up with the basic MCU story?” I’m getting old.

That being said…

  • Marvel’s What If looks pretty good. It’ll be nice to see Yondu again.
  • The I Am Groot shorts and the GOTG Holiday Special excite me, but since the Special is coming out in 2022 I guess that’s confirmation we won’t see GOTG 3 until 2023 at least. Also, how on Earth are they going to do it without Gamora, who is still AWOL in-canon? :/
  • I guess the third MCU Spider-Man really will be a multiverse and I don’t know how to feel about that.
  • Fantastic Four? In this economy?
  • omg Xochitl Gomez (Dawn from The Babysitters Club) is playing America Chavez! I’m super unfamiliar with the character but she’s such a good young actress, I’m so happy for her!
  • Oh a Buzz Lightyear thing! I guess that means Buzz Lightyear of Star Command (I used to love that show as a kid) isn’t canon anymore? That’s a shame. I am pettily delighted that Chris Evans has basically taken over from all-round asshole Tim Allen though.
  • Honestly the news that T’Challa won’t be recast is kind of really saddening, to me at least. That means he as a character is dead in-universe, after cheating death a couple of times already. He was a great character even without the superheroics and now he’s just gone. I get it but man, how absolutely crushing.
  • Oh wow a Tiana/Princess and the Frog show! Wow finally Disney are paying attention to her. It only took what, ten years after the movie?
  • Obviously Hayden Christensen back as Anakin is the big exciting news!! for me, but the other Star Wars stuff looks good too. It’ll be nice to have a Lando show. (I was kind of hoping it’d be Old Lando looking for his daughter rather than Young Lando though.)
  • I wonder if they can sneak Hayden into the new Ahsoka show as well.

Note that all these announcements happened around 1am my time.

Harry Osborn’s Comic Appearances: Amazing Spider-Man #40 (1966)

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Here we are, the fallout from last week! The Green Goblin took his mask off and revealed himself to be… Peter’s high-school bully’s friend’s dad. Not exactly a “No, I am your father” level revelation… well, not yet anyway…

Peter begins by slagging off Harry, even though they’re teetering more to being almost-friends at this point. Oh sure he’s stalling for time! But I suspect in-universe Peter regretted those words once he came to love Harry.

Reading some of these lines in the present day, knowing the rest of the story, you just gotta go

or is that just me?

Here’s baby Harry, wearing the Spider-Man colours to boot. Norman tells this story as if he was a perfectly good father temporarily sidetracked, and maybe that’s what Stan Lee planned back then, but in the modern day comics this is… very much not the case.

See that red bike there? That bike will many years later play a starring role in a story detailing Norman’s abuse of Harry during this period.

“I couldn’t be bothered with him” could be the tagline for a heavy book titled “Norman Osborn’s Guide To Parenting.”

Many years later it would be retconned so Harry was responsible for the explosion in question. Which makes his thought bubble here kinda make no sense, except for the “It’s all my fault” bit.

“How did someone like me ever have a sniveling weaking of a son like you?” is the other, probably even more accurate tagline for Norman Osborn’s Guide To Parenting.

Poor Harry. It feels like that nurse in the background is looking on like, “hmm maybe someone should intervene to help that kid.” (ur, yeah.)

Norman just casually designing his supervillain suit to match that one pink satchel he already has.


One fight later:

He has… AMNESIA! This would be a get-out-of-jail card deployed by Spidey writers for quite a while.

“It would break his heart!” Told you Peter was SUCH A LOVELY KID, he barely knows Harry at this point and his initial impressions were nothing but negative.

It was not.

Harry Osborn’s Comic Appearances: Amazing Spider-Man #39 (1966)

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Well today I remembered that there’s over fifty years of comic book history to get through here, so I’d better crack on.

Gwen, Flash and a random ginger kid who I don’t believe we ever see again are badmouthing Peter, who honestly has every reason to blank them at this point.

And here we get a glimpse inside Harry’s thoughts for the first time! He is, of course, angsting about his dad. Ah Harry, if only you knew how much worse it will get eventually.

Here we go! The moment they become friends! Or at least not enemies!

This moment, a BIG one in spiderhistory it would later transpire, gets revisited for the Harry-back-from-the-dead issue Amazing Spider-Man Family #4 in 2009. But we’re a looooong way from there yet.

Awww, how absolutely ridiculously lovely is Peter? Upon hearing that his school bully is going through a tough time he is GENIUNELY SORRY! Even puts his hand on Harry’s shoulder. This is the first time they ever touch and it won’t be the last.

Also note that Harry is wearing green here! Gosh I wonder why.

Harry claims here that he and Norman used to be “pals.” This would later be retconned to be THOROUGHLY not true, Norman was just a flat out abuser, but well since Harry has maintained love for his abuser (something depressingly accurate for abused kids in real life) right up to more modern issues of the comics you can handwave that line away.

I don’t know what a dutch uncle is either. Also yes Flash you’re right! Gosh these kids are all so dumb I love them.

Wait for it…

norman: tis I, your worst enemy
peter: Holy crap! You’re…that one guy’s weirdly identical father?

Another BIG MOMENT! Told you this issue was full of them!

We’ll deal with this not-remotely-a-revelation-anymore next post…

Some good halloween cosplays I saw online this weekend

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(Since there was obviously no Halloween this year.)

Master Windu from StarWars
What kind of a woman doesn’t own an ax? 🎃 from brooklynninenine
Did you give my Uncle Ben a chance? Did you?! from Spiderman
Asami Sato cosplay by Kamiko-Zero from TheLastAirbender
[No Spoilers] I’m sure you saw tons of great costumes this weekend, but I still love this pic from when 87 year old ‘Game of Thrones Granny’ CosPlay made EVERYONE cheer at DragonCon (video in comments) from gameofthrones

WAIT WHAT

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Okay so you know I’m obsessed with the Spider-Man trilogy right? Well it turns out they RELEASED A WHOLE NEW VERSION of Spider-Man 3 and I… didn’t know. I mean I was sort of aware there was a editor’s cut around but I didn’t think it changed the movie this much.

Instead, an alternate take of Ursula alerting Peter that MJ has been trying to reach him is used later in the film, and Peter apologizes for his symbiote-influenced behavior to Ursula.

!!!!!

In his human form, Flint watches his wife and daughter depart before the scene transitions to him accepting Venom’s offer to team up against Spider-Man. His emotional motivation for this agreement is now underscored by the restored scene.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Instead, after angrily sending Peter away, Harry spots a framed photograph of himself, Peter and Mary Jane from happier times with the glass broken. Contemplating his broken friendships, Harry decides completely on his own to reconcile with Peter without learning the truth about Spider-Man’s innocence in Norman’s death.

!!!!!!!!!!!!! My gosh this is almost enough to make up for the horrible anxiety-inducing thing going on in the comic right now.

Harry Osborn’s Comic Appearances: Amazing Spider-Man #34 – #38

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Welcome back, true believers! Okay so the other day this happened in the spideycomicsverse and it reminded me to kick this little project back into gear.

So! Last post we met Harry for the very first time and he was, to be honest, incredibly meh. But only SO FAR! Because the man who would end up being the Big Bad of the Spiderverse is coming and Harry just so happens to be his son and heir.

But before any of that takes place, here’s ASM #34, in which Harry continues to be Flash Thompson’s rather uninteresting henchman.

In case you’re wondering who Mao Tse-Tung is, that would be Chairman Mao. In the year this comic was written, 1966, he started the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. So… uh… yeah.

Harry thinks Peter is a snob, which is kinda weird seeing as Harry is the son of a wealthy businessman and Peter is a broke orphan. You’d think it’d be the other way around. (I suppose he means intellectual snobbery.) Geez you’d never expect them to end up with one of the most enduring friendships in all Spider-Man media would you?

On to ASM #37 and this is the VERY FIRST TIME (I think) Norman Osborn is ever named. Humble beginnings and all that.

But first we meet Gwen’s Giant Hand.

Original Pre-Death Gwen is almost completely forgotten but she was hella cool. In amongst all the giggle-worthy Sixties slang you get the idea that geez it must really have sucked being a female science student in that era so no wonder she’s angry all the time.

Hereeeeee’s Norman!

And he’s a PRICK!

Even taking the very different approved fatherhood qualities of the ’60s into account Norman’s just a kinda a dick to his son here. Of course, we’ve barely scratched the surface of that yet, we have many issues and many increasingly disturbing modern-day retcons to go.

Now, in ASM #38 we’ve got Norman being more affable to his kid, and then dressing as the guy from Breaking Bad before Breaking Bad existed.

But this is primarily about Harry so what’s going on over at the college? Well, there’s a protest it seems.

This little scene remains a complete and utter mystery to me. What are they protesting about!? Based on the dialogue given to the student protestors Stan Lee does not seem to like them? For some reason? But there were SURE AS HELL things to protest about in the ’60s so this bit just comes off as really uncomfortable and Old Man Yells At Cloud.

(This is Lawrence Welk, by the way, and I don’t know what that insult is supposed to mean either.)

Man you sure can be clueless about a lot of history via comics! (No I’m not American.)

Anyway Harry in this issue is just a regular old weaselly coward, nothing’s changed there-

-but things are ABOUT TO! Stuff happens next issue which shaped ALL of Spider-Man comics to come!

a bad Harry Osborn update

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I don’t read comics anymore because they are Very Expensive. However I do tend to google how my faves are doing every now and again and it turns out that a few days ago Harry went back to being a supervillain again.

(just not the Green Goblin this time. Also Norman is good or neutral now for some reason.)

So I’ve talked before about why Harry is important to me in terms of presenting characters with mental illnesses. And that still very much stands. Making him an evil supervillain again after he’s already overcome the dark side of his nature ruins everything. This reddit comment I thought summed up nicely why this is a terrible twist even if this Harry isn’t “our” Harry right now…

(comics eh)

Okay I’ll admit that chances are this will all be resolved pretty quickly, heck Norman saying “my son” could also refer to Gabriel Stacy (remember him?) which would make more sense. But right now I’m disappointed. :/

Jamie Foxx confirms his return as Electro and says he “won’t be blue in this one” —

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By Stephen Ippolito | October 2nd, 2020 Yesterday MCU fans learned some shocking news. Actor Jamie Foxx will return to play Electro in the upcoming Spider-Man 3 film. This afternoon, the actor confirmed the news in a post on his Instagram account that has since been deleted. The photo that he also posted, shows three […]

Jamie Foxx confirms his return as Electro and says he “won’t be blue in this one” —

Weeeeell this is an all-round interesting development. And the fan poster Foxx tweeted is even more interesting.

I don’t actually want there to be a live-action Spiderverse though. :/ I have lots of very complicated thoughts there.

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