Gwen Stacy is no more. She died in Amazing Spider-Man #121 and to THIS DAY, remarkably, her death is yet to be fully undone. (Oh, Spider-Gwen? She’s an alternate universe.)

It was a story that shook the world of Spider-Man to its core and we’re not done with it yet! Let’s take a look at poor Harry Osborn in Amazing Spider-Man #122. He’s about to SUFFER. Let’s open with a bang:

It always annoys me that Gwen is in pink on the famous cover. She died in green, dammit! To match the Green Goblin!

For as much as our ever-suffering Harry suffers in this comic, Peter suffers more. He really loved Gwen and her death devastates him.

Peter tending to Gwen’s body after the Goblin has fled and the police arrived always breaks my heart.

He doesn’t figure much into the story at all, but I always liked that one sympathetic cop who is torn between his compassion for Spider-Man and his duty.

Slightly cracked?

Peter is well aware that Norman is the father of his best friend, but that’s not about to stop him. He storms to Norman’s townhouse hell-bent on revenge.

GOD ONLY KNOWS how that talk would have gone if Harry had been in a position to have it. I don’t think Peter in this state would have been able to gently break the news of Gwen’s death, let only the fact that it was at Norman’s hands.

Another sad, sad set of panels in a comic full of them. (Here’s a great post about the sadness of “I’ve got more important things to do than hold your hand” specifically.) Harry is, indeed, all alone.

Which always reminds me of this flashback from American Son (ASM #599).

It was a promise Peter couldn’t keep in the end.

Peter chooses revenge, just as Harry will later.

“Don’t leave me, Peter,” Harry begs. But Peter leaves anyway.

All is in place for a showdown where only one man will leave alive.

Peter pulls no punches killing the man who killed Gwen. But in the end, Norman’s death is an accident, because Peter is a hero and cannot get his hands dirty.

“What worth is there in the paltry existence of one useless female?” I find Norman’s misogyny so fascinating, always have. He’s a man who likes to hurt women – Emily, Gwen, Lily Hollister later on. The Raimi films ran with it a bit (see here for a gifset I made!) but these days it’s completely forgotten. And yet another reason why the oh so stupid “Norman got his evil blasted out of him!” current day story is awful.

Peter stops at the very last moment. No matter what, he can’t bring himself to take another human life.

But Norman has no such qualms. He oh so nearly kills Peter with his glider, but thanks to Peter’s spidey-sense, he lunges out of the way. The glider hits Norman (bloodlessly!) and kills him. Or So We Thought.

Yeah, Norman will be back, but that doesn’t take away from the power of this story.

….And all along, Harry has been watching.

So based on what we know from this and later comics, Harry pulled himself up from a drug-induced breakdown, tracked down Norman somehow, learned his father had murdered one of his dearest friends (which I gather he instantly went into denial about), and then seen Spider-Man kill his father. Harry doesn’t know Peter is Spider-Man at this point, but damn, no wonder he breaks down completely.

Also can you believe we have NEVER, in any comic, seen this scene from Harry’s perspective? Continuity is a bit fuzzy about it, I think, but it’s weird that no Harry story has ever flashed back to it.

The story is over, but ooh look, here’s an epilogue of Mary Jane putting aside her grief to be there for Peter.

The beginning of a new love story. Life goes on.