Spectacular Spider-Man #200

[cyberghostface]

“You’ve got two best friends who truly love each other but are also mortal enemies. If that isn’t a recipe for great drama, what is? Harry and Peter are both very complex people, which meant that while the superhero action played out there was lots of room for psychological and emotional exploration.” -- J.M. DeMatteis

Spectacular Spider-Man #200 is in my opinion one of the best Spider-Man issues of all time. Unfortunately Marvel seems to be intent on destroying its legacy; first by cheapening it by undoing Harry's death and then with Nick Spencer trying to 'fix' it by revealing that Harry was dead all along but he went to Hell and came back as a centipede-infested corpse-thing.

Nevertheless with Spencer's run concluding this week, let's take a look back...













While Harry makes it clear he won't harm Mary Jane he still has it in for Peter and things eventually reach their boiling point.

Comments

[mazway_75]

Also how the Spider-Girl series had May facing a grown up Normie but able to get through to him not to continue this legacy of hate.

It was powerful yes but, like Norman, Harry was more memorable in death haunting Peter than bringing him to life, yet another reason to hate OMD.

[cyberghostface]

Norman’s return at least was inevitable for a number of reasons, the least of which was the gaping hole he left that other authors were trying to fill. If he hadn’t been resurrected to make sense of the Clone Saga he definitely would have been brought back at some point during the last twenty years. He’s too big of a villain to leave dead forever.

I don’t think anyone was clamoring for Harry to return though.

[tinygaylaura]

Bringing Harry back was such a terrible decision honestly. Especially when everything Marvel has done with him since making the decision has pretty much just served to ruin the ending this story gave him

[dragontail]

So glad you mentioned Spider-Girl. There are many reasons I consider that my preferred version of the Spidey canon (verse?), but the fact it didn't retcon either Spec #200 or ASM # 400 is a biiiiiiiiiiig part of that.

Love Spec #200, as I do the majority of JM's work on Peter and co.

[lbd_nytetrayn]

So, why did Normie go bad?

[cyberghostface]

He blamed Spidey for the deaths of Norman and Harry and then his mother’s death pushed him over the edge.

[mastermahan]

But like mazway_75 says, May talks him down and he's a reliable family friend for the rest of the series. He gets therapy, bonds with his stepdad Foggy Nelson, and helps outfit May and Phil Urich with tech and a base.

[cyberghostface]

I know. They were asking why he went bad in the first place.

[scorntx]

What is this "ther-ap-y" you speak of?

[tcampbell1000]

I do think this is a good story and I also have little patience with Kindred...but I will defend the decision to bring Harry Osborn back.

Spider-Man comics often seem to me like Shakespearean tragedies with deferred endings: Spidey, Jameson, and many of the villains seem marked by tragic flaws that would destroy them in a classic play but, thanks to the nature of serial publication, rarely do in the comics. The Spider-movies, which do have at least interstitial endings, tend to just pick this aspect up and run with it. The films' Green Goblins, like their Doctor Octopus, Sandman, Lizard, Vulture, and Mysterio, are largely architects of their own ends. (The MCU influence starts pulling the newer films away from this mold: the Vulture survives his arc and Mysterio is maybe not really dead. But you can still see how certain flawed choices they make aid in their defeats.)

Viewed through that lens, the Osborn family and Harry in particular are the Shakespeareiest of the Spider-villains, and that's their best claim to genuine greatness. (It's sure a lot more impressive than engineering the death of an unconscious teenager, NORMAN.) And by granting Harry's arc a conclusion here, DeMatteis and Buscema fulfill that promise.

But there's another way to look at it.

Because we can't go through life accepting our stories are tragedies. We can't accept it of our friends, either. And we read Spider-Man hoping that Peter will overcome that massive guilt complex enough to find more happiness than sorrow in his life. We hope he'll end his days not at the bottom of a supervillain dogpile, but old and happy with some loved ones around him. Until we're dead, there's always a chance for a better tomorrow, for (dare I say it) one more brand new day. So maybe the way serial comics almost never end shouldn't be seen as a failure. Maybe it's a strength.

And so I was intrigued and engaged when the comics "reset" Harry and his struggle took on new dimensions. He chased the surface signifiers of success, enjoying his wealth and a trophy girlfriend. He grappled with the controlling nature of a living father, not just a weird ghostly legacy. He was a new man, pulled between his seeming destiny and a chance for growth...

...and that's exactly why I'm pretty unimpressed with Kindred, because he's not representative of any possible growth for Harry. He's just a Black Lantern rehashing a lot of continuity the series was better off moving beyond. Look, KINDRED, "Gotcha" was a decent line the first time "you" used it, but it's a little late in the game to start pretending like it was your catchphrase all along.

[tinygaylaura]

I think the whole Kindred plot is an example of the negative side of caring about continuity

You've got people like Kurt Busiek and Al Ewing who have a terrifying photographic memory for comics continuity and use this power for good

And then you have Nick Spencer's bullshit where a writer fixates on one random shitty story no one likes or cares about and builds a 75 issue story arc around writing whats basically glorified fix-fic for it which just makes everything worse

Scott Snyder is probably somewhere in the mjddle

[starwolf_oakley]

Some writers have gone with "Crusher Hogan was the opponent in Battlin' Jack Murdock's last boxing match." Which I think Jeph Loeb started.

[mastermahan]

Huh, I always assumed Jack Murdoch's opponent in his last boxing match was, you know, a boxer. Did Evander Holyfield ever have a boxing match with Stardust?

[starwolf_oakley]

I meant Crusher Creel.

[mastermahan]

Oh. I didn't remember which Crusher it was either. And frankly, making a boxer box a wrestler is exactly the sort of thing I'd expect from Jeph Loeb.

[thumbs13]

I thought they changed it so that Jack Murdock's final opponent was absorbing man before he got his powers, and Rocky Davis was a stage name.

[starwolf_oakley]

That should say Crusher Creel. I typed Crusher Hogan because I'm an idiot.

[scorntx]

Moving stuff.
Later developments might undo the poignancy (like the Clone Saga), but still, in the moment, it's powerful stuff.

(Meanwhile, much as the art and writing are great, I am wondering just how hard Pete and Harry must be punching each other to produce those loud "BTHOOM!"s every time they land a hit, while not causing severe injury...
... maybe it's not just the dodgy formula that does Harry in?)

Any inconsistencies in Harry's lines of logic can be excused by him not being in his right mind.
Like kidnapping MJ and taking her to the place her friend died just to... have a chat. Mixed messages.
But also, between the examples on display here, and everything that's happened with Kindred, it seems like one of the real tragedies of Harry is that he is just terrible at being a supervillain.
Maybe he should've tried his hand at something else.
Anything else.

[blues32]

You know, I was indifferent when Harry was brought back. A bit confused as to why, but whatever. But as time went on, Harry did something he never had the chance to do before. Tell his father where to shove it. Prove Norman wrong in all the right ways. And to be fair, he was better at being the Green Goblin anyway. Harry hit where it hurt while Norman always had these extravagant, silly plans.

But then this KINDRED stuff happened. And at first, I was cool with that because I assumed Kindred was some sort of remnant of the pre OMD Harry. I liked the idea of the broken Harry seeing what a healed Harry could do for himself and his family. But no. No, this whole thing was some insane plan that made NO sense whatsoever. What was the whole reason Harry was trying to kill Peter? Because he believed Peter murdered his father. BUT...it turns out he ALWAYS knew his dad would return, so he hired people to put on the single most bizarre revenge plot I have ever heard of. Why is there even a Harry clone? Harry didn't know he was going to die, did he? I mean, if he did, it makes the time he tried to dunk Normie into a vat of Goblin Forumla (or rather another AI of Harry tried to) really twisted.