Amazing Spider-Man Annual 2000
Old Acquaintances!
Spider-Man is out on patrol wondering if sitting around waiting for things to happen when suddenly someone screams. He follows the sound of the screams and realizes that they are coming from the penthouse apartment of Liz Osborn and her son Normie. Even though they don’t like the wall-crawler overly much, Spider-Man sings in through their patio door and ambushes the masked me who have broken into Liz’s home. He finds something familiar about these men and realizes they are wearing the ceremonial outfits worn by members of the Brotherhood of Scriers. He then hears Liz scream again and runs to her bedroom where he saves her and Normie from two more Scriers. Seeing that Normie is very upset, Spider-Man tries to assure the boy that he is here to help, but Liz points out that her son is terrified of Spider-Man.[1] While she is grateful that the wall-crawler saved her and her son, she asks him to leave. That’s when the ringleader of these Scriers enters the room. A muscular man with a pony-tail with various facial piercings and a strange symbol tattooed on his chest. This nameless man is unimpressed with meeting Spider-Man in person. When Spider-Man gives this man the nickname Scrier, Junior, the man says that is as suitable a name as any.[2] When Spider-Man tries to attack this Scrier, he easily knocks Spider-Man aside. He then convinces Normie to come to him, promising that if the boy comes with him, he will make sure that Spider-Man never hurts him again. When Spider-Man recovers from his beating the Scrier has departed with Normie. When the wall-crawler promises Liz that he’ll save Normie, she tells him to leave it alone because whenever Spider-Man gets involved in her life, somebody dies. Spider-Man swings away, but he refuses to do nothing and intends to prove Liz wrong.
Trying to clear his head after his beating, Spider-Man swings across the city trying to figure out what to do next. That’s when he sees what appears to be Harry Osborn on a nearby rooftop. Spider-Man can’t believe what he is seeing and blacks out again, falling in mid-swing to the ground below. Spider-Man dreams about his past with Harry Osborn. How at times he thought that Harry was the only friend he had. He recalls how his father, Norman Osborn, as the Green Goblin killed his girlfriend, Gwen Stacy.[3] Peter also blames Norman for Harry’s descent into becoming the Green Goblin as well, something that eventually led to his death.[4] When Spider-Man wakes up he dismisses it as a trick his mind was playing on him, when suddenly Harry appears before him and asks Spider-Man to save his son.[5] Spider-Man can’t believe this is Harry and when he tries to tackle him, the wall-crawler passes through him and smashes into some construction supplies. When he wakes up again it’s when the police have arrived on the scene. When he realizes the person posing as Harry has disappeared, he evades the police. As Spider-Man swings away he figures he’s taken too many blows to the head and decides to go home. As it starts to rain, he thinks about what Liz said earlier and wonders if he shouldn’t get involved, thinking of how many people died on his watch.[6]
That’s when the phantom of Harry appears again and pleads with Spider-Man to just listen to him. When Spider-Man tries to grab the man he thinks is an imposter Harry suddenly disappears and appears in another location altogether. Harry insists that this isn’t some super-villains trick and can empathize with how Peter is feeling right now but insists that this is all about saving Normie from his captors. Spider-Man refuses to believe that this is his Harry and he tells this apparition that the Harry he knew and love died years before he physically died. Harry is willing to accept that and suggests they leave that Harry in the past and that this Harry just wants to save a little boy all Spider-Man has to do is decide on whether he’ll accept his help.
Elsewhere, the leader of the Scriers can’t believe how easy his job is going to be since Normie Osborn has such a deep hatred for Spider-Man already. He then thinks about how Normie’s grandfather, Norman Osborn, insinuated himself into the organization.[7] He then scolds his followers for cowering at the mention of the elder Osborn’s name and warns them that they will all die at his hand like he should have done with Norman Osborn. He recounts how he had the chance after Norman’s last failed attempt to destroy Spider-Man and the rest of the Brotherhood broke him out of an insane asylum. He sees Norman Osborn as a failure and a reminder that the Scriers should stick to their old ways and that is why he had formed this splinter group of younger Scriers who are still true to the old ways and not tainted by Norman Osborn’s criminal enterprises. Hearing his grandfather’s name, Normie asks the Scrier if he knows his father. He says he does, and that Norman Osborn will be back and he and Normie will have a surprise for him when he does.
Suddenly, Spider-Man comes crashing through the window and faces the Scrier again.[8] This time Spider-Man is ready for the Scrier’s enhanced strength and fighting ability. More, he’s angry as he thinks that the Scrier is behind the appearances of Harry. The Scrier has no idea what Spider-Man is talking about when suddenly Harry reappears and says that the wall-crawler is referring to him. Realizing what this is, the Scrier can’t believe it, as he thought it was nothing more than a computer glitch. When Normie sees the figure standing before Scrier he calls him daddy and Harry confirms this. This causes the Scrier to start laughing like a lunatic. Spider-Man demands an explanation and Harry decides that the wall-crawler does deserve some answers. He explains that the rebel Scrier, despite his claims to wanting to go back to the old ways, also dabbles in new technology. He explains that he and the other rogue Scriers built a computer that could gather all the available data about the real Harry Osborn in order to create him, an artificially intelligent holographic simulacrum of Harry Osborn that they can use to manipulate Normie Osborn into killing his grandfather. The Scrier finds it funny that this computer simulation is talking as though he were the real thing. That’s when “Harry” explains that somehow the Scrier’s experts did their job a little too well and he won’t allow them to taint his son like his father did to him and vows that the Goblin Legacy will die with him. By this point, the Scrier is sick of listening to this drivel and resumes his fight with Spider-Man.
As the two fight it out, Harry tells the wall-crawler that the Scrier’s powers aren’t mystical but derived with technology and that the power source is hidden in his gauntlets. Sure enough, when Spider-Man pushes the two gauntlets together it causes feedback that knocks out the Scrier. While Spider-Man recovers from the battle, the Harry hologram takes his son aside to talk to him privately. After he tells Spider-Man that he told Normie that he needs to look up to Spider-Man because he is a hero. Saying he has to go, Spider-Man asks if he is really Harry, and the hologram says that he is as close as it gets before disappearing. By this time, the Scrier recovers from the incident and grabs Normie and threatens to kill the boy. He decides that since he can’t kill Norman Osborn he can make him weakening by killing his only heir. That’s when a pair of hands reach out from the shadows and snap the Scrier’s neck.[9] Normie sees who it is, but he won’t say and when Spider-Man searches the shadows he finds nobody. He then asks the boy if he wants to go home and to his surprise, Normie goes with him without any complaint.
Recurring Characters
Spider-Man, Liz Osborn, Normie Osborn
Continuity Notes
Normie is frightened of Spider-Man because he blames him for his father “going away”. His father, Harry Osborn, became the second Green Goblin and later seemingly died due to a side-effect of the Goblin Formula he ingested as seen in Spectacular Spider-Man #200. Unknown to everyone at this time, Harry actually survived and was spirited away to Europe by his father who allowed the world to continue thinking Harry was dead. This will be revealed in Amazing Spider-Man #581.
Spider-Man met the true Scrier in Peter Parker: Spider-Man Annual 1999, hence the nickname. However, there is no known connection between the true Scrier and this character. He is later identified as Matthew DeRoma in the Cabal of Scriers entry in Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A-Z Update #2.
Norman Osborn murdered Gwen Stacy in Amazing Spider-Man #121.
Harry’s first descent into madness happened after his father was seemingly killed in a fight with Spider-Man in Amazing Spider-Man #122 (he didn’t check out Spider-Man: The Osborn Journal #1) which led to him becoming the Green Goblin for the first time in Amazing Spider-Man #136-137. Harry became the Goblin a few times after that in Amazing Spider-Man #180 to stop Bart Hamilton from usurping the identity, Amazing Spider-Man #312 to defend his family from the Hobgoblin, and he briefly attempted becoming a heroic Goblin in Web of Spider-Man #66-67. He became mentally unhinged again in Spectacular Spider-Man #179 becoming the Goblin intermittently until he allegedly died in the aforementioned Spectacular Spider-Man #200.
Peter mentioned the disappearance of his wife Mary Jane. Mary Jane is believed to have died in a plane explosion in Amazing Spider-Man (vol. 2) #13. She actually survived as Peter will soon discover in Amazing Spider-Man (vol. 2) #29. He refers to her as his wife here, but years later their marriage is erased from existence by Mephisto in Amazing Spider-Man #545. In the new timeline, Peter would refer to Mary Jane as his fiancee instead of his wife.
Peter goes through the list of families that have suffered because of Spider-Man being in their lives. Which covers the gamut of other people who have died that I haven’t mentioned above, namely George Stacy (Amazing Spider-Man #90) and dear old Uncle Ben (Amazing Fantasy #15).
Norman Osborn joined the Brotherhood of Scriers and eventually became leader as explained in Spider-Man: The Osborn Journal #1. DeRoma also mentions how the Scriers recently broke Norman Osborn out of an insane asylum recently. That happened in Spider-Man #98 at the end of the Final Chapter story arc.
Spider-Man makes a quip about not calling him during that week’s episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. This should be considered a topical reference per the Sliding Timescale of Earth-616.
DeRoma says that Norman Osborn will be back, he’s not wrong as seen in Spider-Man: Return of the Green Goblin #1. It’s implied that the man who snapped DeRoma’s neck is Norman. The Scrier’s handbook entry says it was possibly Norman Osborn who killed DeRoma. I don’t see any reason why it could be anybody else.
Continuity Errors
Peter Parker says that he and Harry had been friends since high school. This is not correct. Peter first met Harry when he was in high school in Untold Tales of Spider-Man #8, but that was while he was in costume. He first interacted with Harry Osborn as Peter Parker in Amazing Spider-Man #31, but which point both young men had graduated from high school and attending Empire State University. We can probably cut Peter some slack here since he just got his ass kicked and then suffered a long fall.
Another error is the statement that by the time Peter and Harry got to college he was steadily dating Liz Allan. This is another error. Liz didn’t go to college with Peter and Harry. She disappeared from Peter’s life shortly after he graduated from high school in Amazing Spider-Man #28. Liz didn’t come back into Peter Parker’s life until Amazing Spider-Man #132. The pair wouldn’t start dating until around Amazing Spider-Man #157. This happened long after most of Spider-Man’s conflicts with the original Green Goblin.
Betrayal!
The Sandman breaks into the Davis Gallery, using his sand powers to easily slip past the state-of-the-art security systems with ease. He has come to steal a priceless idol which is surrounded by infrared beams. Using a new technique taught to him by the Wizard, the Sandman creates tiny mirrors out of the sand to deflect the beams. Before he can take the item, he is interrupted by his former employer Silver Sable. She is disappointed to see that he has gone back to a life of crime and that he left her and her Wild Pack without saying goodbye. Preparing to attack, the Sandman tells her that he doesn’t owe her an explanation for anything.[1]
As he attacks her, Silver Sable is able to hold her own at first but soon the Sandman manages to grab hold of her. However, before he can suffocate her in his sand, the rest of the Wild Pack leaps out of their hiding places. They supercharge his body with electricity causing his form to explode in a spray of dust particles. While the rest of the team hopes that they killed him, Silver Sable is certain that he survived and wished that this encounter could have gone better.
The Sandman did indeed escape and soon pours out of a drainpipe onto a beach. He contemplates going back but decides against it and angrily smashes the pipe he escaped through. He wonders if he could bring himself to kill Silver Sable and figures he’ll find out the next time they meet.
Recurring Characters
Sandman, Silver Sable, Wild Pack (Powell, Chen, Battlestar, Crippler)
Continuity Notes
There is a lot of Sandman related drama to unpack in this story, so let’s get it all out of the way:
The Sandman has been a career criminal for most of his life since Amazing Spider-Man #4.
He decided to go straight in Marvel Two-In-One #86.
He was employed by Silver Sable in Amazing Spider-Man #281 and later joined the Wild Pack in Silver Sable and the Wild Pack #1.
Later, the Wizard used his ID-Machine to make him a villain again as seen in Peter Parker: Spider-Man #12.
