The hype continues to mount for the imminent release of Spider-Man: No Way Home. For the first time, the main excitement for fans isn't in seeing Tom Holland's Spider-Man again, but the characters from previous live-action Spider-Man movies whose presence has been confirmed or teased so far. One such character is Willem Dafoe's Norman Osborn aka the Green Goblin, who gets some valuable screen time in a new Spider-Man: No Way Home TV spot.
Dafoe was the first classic villain from the comics to square off against a live-action version of the webbed wall-crawler in Sam Raimi's Spider-Man movie from 2002. Although Norman died at the end of that movie, he is now confirmed to be returning for Spider-Man: No Way Home with a whole new, comic-accurate look.
In the TV spot, we see the Green Goblin appearing much as he did in his original film, complete with his full-body green plastic suit and glider. In a later clip, the Goblin's mask is seen lying smashed on the ground while Norman appears to be fleeing from the scene in the background.
Finally, we see Norman once again on his glider facing off against Holland's Spider-Man. This time Norman is not wearing his mask and is instead wearing hooded rags that are much closer in appearance to his comic book counterpart's costume. The demented smile on Norman's face in the scene is proof that he is still very much a villain, as is the fact that he is throwing one of his bombs at Spidey.
It is not yet clear why exactly so many old Spider-Man villains started showing up all at the same time in Spidey's neighborhood after Doctor Strange's reality-altering spell went awry. But a previous interview with Dafoe, Alfred Molina (Doc Ock), and Jamie Foxx (Electro) revealed that each villain has a different motivation for getting into a tussle with the new Spider-Man.
"The Goblin believes in a world with losers and winners," Dafoe explained. "Power is all that matters." Molina stated that Doc Ock's story gets picked up from where Sam Raimi's Spider-Man 2 left off, and his character is "looking for revenge." Finally, according to Foxx, his character wants to make up for a lifetime of disappointments. "Electro is like, 'The world did me wrong. Now I got this energy, I'm going to get mine.'"
It seems each major villain in the movie is nursing some personal grievance. And Holland's Spider-Man isn't feeling so hot himself. In the new TV spot, he is seen speaking directly to the world as Spider-Man where he admits that he is responsible for bringing the three main villains from their reality into his, and asking the world to wish him luck as he attempts to send them back where they belong. Fans continue to hope that Holland's overwhelmed Spider-Man will be getting help from other versions of the arachnid hero played by Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield.
Spider-Man: No Way Home is coming to theaters on December 17.