Joe Hollon:  "Norman is the father of Peter's best friend.  When he transforms into the Goblin he knows Peter's identity.  So Spider-Man must defeat him while trying to keep his own identity safe and trying to prevent the public from finding out the Green Goblin is Harry's father.  When he reverts to Norman, he does not remember anything about being the Goblin.  This could've gone on for decades!"

I dunno... maybe it was the way it was handled, but having read the books of that period I think three times was just right. 

But if you're going to go that route, I preferred the idea of doing it with Harry.  For one thing, much more pathos when it IS the best friend plus you get the added bonus of a "Will he or won't he?"  Will he reach the depths his father did or will he manage to battle through it?   

Steven Myers "How did Norman Osborn become "Lex Luthor", when he was a regular guy half the time before he died?"

IMO, retroactive reputation.  When alive, Norman was just one of the rotation.  But by killing off Gwen and dying the way he did, he got to be Spider-Man's Greatest Enemy.  So him killing off Gwen in a fit of pique is now treated like the culmination of a grand scheme and despite having no demonstrated talent for psychological warfare (that was more Harry's bag), he gets to be involved with complex plots to make Peter think he's a clone or framing Spider-Man or whatever.  So it goes.

At what point should an author "know" the payoff of his story? Granted, stories can take on a life of their own, and end up a little differently than intended ... but to change the payoff based on fan guesses kinda seems like cheating.

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What is being overlooked here, by the publishers, is that what has changed is not the likelihood of the readers figuring out what's going on, but the way in which the publishers find out that the readers have figured it out.

I would bet that in pre-internet days there were just as many Big Reveals that were guessed by the readers well in advance. But there was no way to know this had happened, until after publication, when those readers (or, some of them, anyway) would write in saying "I saw THAT coming!" And the usual response of the creative team to such letters was "Suuuure you did!"

Now the guesses are bandied about the interweb, and OF COURSE enough are going to accumulate that will be correct. Throw enough sh*t at the wall. . .    This is precisely why, when I post sneekpeek art, I ask people not to speculate on what's going on, because the odds are SOMEBODY is going to guess correctly. And that guess becomes a spoiler.

But changing stories to try to get around fans having guessed what's going on is a variant on creation by committee -- and we all know how well that works!

And we all know the saying, that is true as well as witty, that a camel is a horse that was designed by a committee. - Alan Sherman, PETER AND THE COMMISSAR

Of course it was impossible to guess Roderick Kingsley was the Hobgoblin since his twin brother Daniel would just put on a wig and pass himself for his brother!

I'm looking forward to see more of Hobgoblin in this november's ASM but I wouldn't hold my breath if that were the same person Roger Stern created.

Too bad Marvel didn't have Roger handle his return.

Joe: because you demanded it...

I'm among the few people out there on the forum who still collect ASM and assorted spin-offs (or am I?) so here you go:

1. Sarah Stacy was last seen about a couple of years in the 2nd volume of Spectacular Spider-Man. She wanted to kill Spidey then backed off. Moved on with her life bearing no grudge.

2. Gabriel Stacy however was recently seen in the abominously drawn "American Son" mini. American Son was a suit of armor Norman designed for Harry during the Dark Reign storyline and that he wanted his son to wear to join his Dark Avengers. Harry refused and moved on with his life bearing a big grudge (again).

The armor was specifically designed to recognize any Osborn DNA. Gabriel overtook the armor and as a shizophrenic saved the day as American Son and shot his half brother Harry in his other persona.

Gabriel was arrested by Spidey and went to jail. His daddy Norman sent him what's left of the armor in prison. To be continued...

3. Joe, you may not have heard about it but Norman isn't a father of 3 but now 4 kids as he recently slept with Lily Hollister, Harry's girlfriend. She's a shizo who went by the name of Menace (an androgynous grey goblin) and now calls herself Goblin Queen. She just gave birth to a beautiful (suuuuure) Namor-like pointed eared-baby that's just been kidnapped by dear ol' Chameleon. You see, this purely goblin-blooded baby is to soon become cancer-eaten Dr Octopus' guinea pig.

Not a hoax, this is exactly what you missed on Amazing Spider-Man...

Please don't ask me if I still like Spidey comics. Let's just say... I still collect it. Period.

He's denied it repeatedly. He's also already said who he intended the Green Goblin to be - a member of Jonah's businessman's club, whose son (with the same distinct hairstyle) went to college with Peter.

ASM 649 cover.

Huge fan of Hobgoblin. However, not a  fan of Humberto Ramos' redesign (at all).

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In the plot-pencils-script style of the "Marvel Method" an artist who is doing the plotting loses control of the work the moment it is turned over to the scripter. I was doing the bulk of the plotting on my last year or so of UNCANNY, but Chris still found ways to script things that I did not intend -- heck, that I had not even THOUGHT of. Often things that tore the guts right out of the story for the sake of a "bit". (Remember the "lesbian incest kiss" moment between Kate and Kitty in the conclusion of "Days of Future Past"? See if you can find it in the pictures!)

Legend has it that Stan scripted the Him storyline in FANTASTIC FOUR in a manner utterly against what Jack plotted.

It happens!