Now

At Dulles International Airport, Norman Osborn waits outside of Air Force One for an in-flight meeting with the President of the United States. With him is is new assistant, Victoria Hand. Norman is annoyed that he has to wait around for the President for some kind of lacky. Victoria’s constant concern with how cold he is getting in the winter weather also rankles him.

When the President finally does show up, Osborn pretends to be pleased to see him and shakes his hand. They are to discuss Osborn’s creation of a replacement for SHIELD, which Norman has taken to calling HAMMER.[1] While Norman wants to get down to business, the President insists on Osborn flying with him to the G8 Summit in Russia to discuss some misgivings that the President has. He is concerned that Norman may have been given too much power when it comes to defending a democratic nation. He has also heard some shocking accusations and wanted to talk to Norman one-on-one to hear his answers to these allegations away from the eyes of the media.

Inside Air Force One, in the President’s private office, Norman discovers who is making these accusations. It is superpowered psychologist Doctor Leonard Samson and he claims to have footage of Norman rampaging through Thunderbolts Mountain as the Green Goblin.[2] Osborn has prepared for this and has something up his sleave…. Literally!

Weeks Ago

A female spy wearing night vision goggles has broken into a former SHIELD weapons depot in the dead of night. Entering a warehouse, she finds a cache of weapons she tries to steal. She removes the night vision goggles to get a better look, revealing the intruder to be Yelena Belova, the second Black Widow.[3] That’s when two guards get the drop on her, but she easily beats them into submission in a matter of minutes. From the darkness comes an applause from Norman Osborn who has been observing her the whole time. He is impressed with her skills and offers Yelena the opportunity to be the new field leader for the Thunderbolts.

Now

As Air Force One flies over Alaska, Doc Samson lays out his psychological evaluation of Norman Osborn. He diagnoses him with a psychotic and psychopathic as well as suffering from bi-polar disorder. Samson concludes that Norman is not fit to walk the streets alone let alone be running homeland security. Osborn scoffs at this and when Leonard mentions how Norman allegedly slaughtered a number of operatives at Thunderbolts Mountain dressed as the Green Goblin, Norman naturally denies this. Claiming to have footage of the incident. Osborn suggests that anybody could have gotten a mask at a store and posed as his former alter ego. Norman then points out that they were under the influence of rogue telepaths that they had incarcerated at Thunderbolts Mountain. He then points out how Samson was culpable in the incident, pointing out how he had smuggled a ceramic knife in when he was supposed to be treating Penance (Robbie Baldwin) and then did nothing when Baldwin nearly beat his teammate Moonstone (Karla Sofen) to death.[4]

Osborn gets up, pretending to answer to these accusations. He taps on his cufflink, activating a device to signal his new team of Thunderbolts to act. Suddenly, Air Force One’s military escort is shot out of the sky by a barrage of missiles. In the cockpit, one of the pilots turns out to be the Black Widow. She knocks out her co-pilot before deploying Ant-Man (Eric O’Grady) who was stowing away on her body at ant size. As the Secret Service attempts to put the evidence of Osborn’s mental illness in the impenetrable safe he is suddenly ambushed by the Ghost, who phases through the hull of the plane and incapacitates agent. He then secures the recording and reports his success back to the team.

Meanwhile, Ant-Man has climbed up onto Samson’s shoulder and planted a tiny gamma ray emitter that is slowly making him more aggressive. That’s when the right side of the hull blows open and the Green Goblin comes flying in on his Gobling Glider, cackling like a madman![5]

Recurring Characters

Thunderbolts (Black Widow, Ant-Man, Ghost), “Green Goblin”, Norman Osborn, Victoria Hand

Continuity Notes

1. This story takes place after the events of Secret Invasion #1-8, wherein the Skrulls failed to invade Earth. Part of their invasion plan was to wipe out all Starktech on Earth, crippling SHIELD. This disgraced and led to Tony Stark (then Director of SHIELD), who was fired from the job. Norman Osborn was given the position because he famously killed the Skrull Queen in the final battle. See Secret Invasion: Dark Reign #1.

2. After capturing four telepaths, the Thunderbolts were all slowly driven mad by their prisoners. This led to Norman temporarily dressing up as the Green Goblin to force those in revolt to submit to him, doing so in a particularly brutal fashion. The security recordings of this incident were stolen by Songbird and given to Samson as a means of blackmailing Osborn. See Thunderbolts #116-121.

3. This isn’t really Yelena Belova, but her predecessor Natasha Romanov in disguise. She is posing as Yelena to infiltrate the Thunderbolts and undermine their operations. This will be revealed in Thunderbolts #134.

4. Penance, aka Robbie Baldwin, was previously the happy-go-lucky hero known as Speedball. That all changed when he was one of the lone survivors of the Stamford Disaster that happened in Civil War #1, which led to the passage of the Super Human Registration Act. Robbie was dragged through the coals and discovered that his powers could only work when he was in pain. He created his Penance persona to atone for his mistake, as seen in Civil War: Front Line #1-10. Baldwin was psychologically analyzed by Samson in the aforementioned Thunderbolts #116-121.

5. As we’ll discover next issue, this impostor is revealed to be the Headsman (Cleavon Twain) in disguise.

Translations

• When finding some weapons at the SHIELD facility, the Black Widow says “ВИАУТІЖУЛ...” to signify that she is saying something in Russian. While the characters used here are in Cyrillic, they don’t actually translate into anything. It’s gibberish.

Topical References

• The President of the United States is depicted as Barack Obama in this story, as he was just recently elected at the time this comic was published in 2009. This should be considered a topical reference as Obama’s time as President came to an end in 2017 after serving two terms.

• The daming evidence of Norman Osborn rampaging through Thunderbolts Mountain in his Green Goblin getup is depicted as being recorded on a DVD. While this was the most common video format at the time this comic was published in 2009, DVD has fallen out of common use thanks to newer formats on the market. As it is on its way into obsolescence, its appearance here should be considered topical.

• The flashback in this story is stated as happening six weeks prior to the main story. This could be considered a topical reference per the Sliding Timescale. Which compresses time in the Marvel Universe on a 4:1 ratio. As such, this flashback would have happened about a week and a half prior rather than six.