written by Nick Spencer
drawn by Ze Carlos, Carlos Gomez and Marcelo Ferreira
colored by Alex Sinclair
Spider-Man goes to confront Kindred one last time, while Mary Jane Watson and Norman Osborn, who have gone to meet with the mysterious villain ahead of Peter, are confronted with some shocking truths. Meanwhile, Carlie Cooper and Harry Osborn make an equally startling discovery in the morgue.
It was a decent enough issue, and that's all I'll say for those wanting to avoid spoilers. For those who want to know more, read on...
(SPOILERS BEGIN)
And with one issue, Nick Spencer almost manages to atone for three years of the often insufferable build-up and filler he stuffed my reading list with to get to this very moment.
This is the moment that the Kindred Saga comes to its head, in which Spencer reveals that "Sins Past," the widely-despised 2004 story in which Marvel's "brain trust" retconned into Spider-Man canon a sexual affair between a middle-aged Norman Osborn and a teenaged Gwen Stacy, was nothing but an elaborate hoax perpetrated by Harry Osborn, acting in conspiracy with Mysterio and Mendel Stromm, on his dad Norman. Not only that, but Mary Jane, who was actually the one who revealed the affair to Peter back then, learns that she was a victim of the hoax too, courtesy of "therapy" sessions with Mysterio masquerading as a psychiatrist.
For a good chunk of the issue, Norman talks to what appears to be an artificial intelligence version of Harry, who tells his "dad" that the elder Osborn never had sex with Gwen, and that he did not father children by her. The entire thing was basically a memory implanted by hypnosis and hallucinogens courtesy of Mysterio and Stromm, who were working under orders that the actual Harry Osborn had given them just before his death in 1993's Spectacular Spider-Man #200.
Thus is the second bombshell dropped in less than five pages: Harry's resurrection from the dead, which was retconned into canon shortly after the events of the similarly-reviled "One More Day," has also been undone. It turns out that the real Harry has spent the last several years either as wormfood or burning in hell while an AI version of him who's been around since the 1990s (our time, not theirs) has been carrying out a really elaborate, long-term revenge plan on both Peter and Norman. Why has Harry been in hell? Well, in yet another retcon, apparently Norman sold Harry's soul to Mephisto when he was just a kid in exchange for fame and fortune.
This is the issue that, for the last seventeen years, I have been pining for, and more recently, since Dan Slott started focusing on Norman Osborn as Peter Parker's biggest of baddies in the last year or so of his run on The Amazing Spider-Man. This is the issue that neither Slott nor Marvel's editorial brain trust during his run had the balls or the storytelling chops to pull off.
As much as I love to take potshots at Spencer's writing, for the remainder of the series I will lay off, because he has done exactly what I have been hoping he would do from the moment it became clear that he had big plans for Norman Osborn in his run. When he undid Slott's silly, hackneyed, "secret identity amnesia" which was never going to last, it became increasingly clear that Spencer had something big planned, especially after his big Kraven arc played out. When he actually NAMED one of his mini story arcs "Sins Past," it was definitely a huge wink and nod to that 2004 clusterfuck, but apparently no one picked up on because they all thought it was a reference to Sin Eater, who was front and center in that story, and because everyone else was obsessed with the notion that Marvel was working up to undo "One More Day" instead.
So no matter how big a headache this issue may be for anyone who isn't familiar with the last three decades of lore, I'm really happy that Spencer pulled the trigger on this audacious retcon of a retcon.
I'd be happier if the art wasn't the usual mashup of several disparate art styles that has been the norm on this book for the last year or so, but given that Marvel has granted one of my most ardent wishes for this title, I have little reason to complain.
There's actually a more than even chance that Spencer could, with his valedictory issue, undo "One More Day" as well, given Mephisto's heavy involvement in this story, but at this point this would just be icing on the cake for me.
8.5/10
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