***Warning: This article contains spoilers for Spider-Man: No Way Home***
Willem Dafoe's performance as Norman Osborne/Green Goblin is undoubtedly one of the most iconic portrayals of a comic book character ever. People have talked about Robert Downey Jr. being the one and only Iron Man, and it's safe to say that the same goes for Dafoe as the iconic Spider-Man villain. The actor embodied the role from head to toe. He made a campy personality believable. Sam Raimi's Spider-Man (2002) would not have broken down the barriers—that superhero movies faced at the time—without Dafoe as the foil for Tobey Maguire's interpretation of the wall-crawling superhero.
That being said, who would have ever thought the man could top his performance from his first outing. Green Goblin was a great villain two decades ago, but it was Dafoe's second shot at the character in Spider-Man: No Way Home that made him terrifying. That isn't to shoot the character down from the first film. In both cases, Green Goblin set the stage for the hero Spider-Man would become, and it was thanks to one actor. Here are Willem Dafoe's best moments as the Green Goblin.
.
8 Fight Against Peter - Spider-Man: No Way Home
Having successfully turned the other villains against Tom Holland's Spider-Man, Green Goblin and his variant foe do battle for the first time in almost 20 years, and, boy, was it brutal. Peter hit the Goblin with everything he had as they rumbled from floor to floor and room to room in a luxury apartment building. Green Goblin merely laughed in Peter's face with each hard-hitting strike, leaving the baffled hero wondering what it would take to put the Goblin away. When the villain finally took control of the battle, he was utterly merciless, pummelling Peter through floors, while laughing at and taunting him the whole way down about his fractured morality. The fight's conclusion would forever shape the hero Peter would become.
7 Norman's Talk With The Goblin - Spider-Man (2002)
Following his first defeat against Spider-Man in the 2002 film, Osborn recuperated in his luxury apartment when he heard an eerily familiar voice. Looking around the room, he found the source coming from his reflection in a nearby mirror. This is the first instance in which the audience becomes fully aware of Norman's split personality and the Goblin persona's hold over him. Norman is terrified as the Goblin hatches his plan to take care of their new foe. Dafoe described this scene as one of his favorites to shoot as it perfectly showcased Norman's declining sanity. Norman could present himself as outwardly normal in one moment, with no one suspecting a thing, before suddenly switching to the Goblin persona, a figure with no qualms about killing anyone who opposed him. Playing Green Goblin allowed Dafoe to chew up the scenery by providing something comedic one second and then going complete intimidation the next.
6 A Very Tense Thanksgiving - Spider-Man (2002)
By this point, Norman is losing his grip on reality. This tense scene comes almost immediately after another confrontation between Green Goblin and Spider-Man in a burning building where the villain cuts his nemesis with a shuriken-like weapon before making his escape. Norman is then seen on his way to a Thanksgiving dinner with his son, Mary Jane, Peter, and Aunt May. When you see him in the elevator on his way up, it's clear that he is losing his grip on reality, and it's almost indiscernible which persona is in control. It's when Peter finally arrives that the tension starts to take off. May slapped Norman's hand when he tried to pick at the dessert, and the facial expression he gave her suggested that the Goblin was in control, something nearly confirmed when he saw the same cut on Peter's arm that he had given Spider-Man just moments earlier. The revelation caused Norman to hastily leave the dinner before he could do anything reckless, but it leaves one to wonder what would have happened had he stayed.
5 Green Goblin's Attacks the Festival - Spider-Man (2002)
Here we see Green Goblin in action for the first time. It's unclear whether or not he anticipated Spider-Man's interference. Still, he quickly made himself a new enemy when he crashed the Unity Day Festival to kill the business partners that booted Norman from his own company. It's here that we also see how unhinged Norman had become when he bombed a balcony that also held his son and Mary Jane without a thought for their safety. Spider-Man, fortunately, saves them, and the two rivals clash in their first battle across the skies as innocent bystanders flee the chaos. It may not have been as action-heavy as their showdown in the film's climax, but the encounter left a bitter taste in the Goblin's mouth as the fight would lead to a significant shift in his main agenda. No longer was he in search of vengeance against treacherous board members—his ultimate goal became to end Spider-Man.
4 Green Goblin's Proposal For Spider-Man - Spider-Man (2002)
Having lured his web-slinging foe to the Daily Bugle, Green Goblin incapacitates Spider-Man and abducts him. However, rather than simply murdering his nemesis and ridding himself of further interference, the villain instead takes him to a rooftop for a chat. It isn't so much the proposal for a partnership that put this scene on this list as it is what the Goblin said before making his offer. Despite everything Peter has done for the people of New York, Green Goblin warns him that the people will eventually come to despise him because the one thing they want most is to see a hero fail. When first viewed, this scene may not seem all that significant, but its importance comes two decades later in Spider-Man: No Way Home. Having been framed for Mysterio's actions and exposing his identity, Peter Parker is met with polarizing results fueled by his universe's version of J. Jonah Jameson. While many still believe Spider-Man to be a hero, others see him as a criminal, proclaiming that "Mysterio was right." Norman's words may not have been meant for Tom Holland's Peter, but he was the one who ultimately proved the Goblin right.
3 Norman is on Sabbatical - Spider-Man: No Way Home
The villains that fell into the MCU discovered that they were pulled from their respective universes moments before dying in battle against Spider-Man. But rather than send them back to their grim fates, Peter chooses to cure them of their respective afflictions so that they may have a chance of rehabilitation and, more significantly, survival. Intelligent scientist that he is, Norman was initially helping Peter while the Goblin persona was tucked away. However, everything changed when Peter's spider sense suddenly activated and led him to web Goblin, who revealed himself to have crept back into control of Norman's body. The change in the inflection of Norman's voice is how you knew the scientist was gone. The alarming change stopped everyone in their tracks as Goblin cut a chilling monologue to Peter, attacking his struggle in balancing his two lives and having to be convinced by his aunt to help the villains. Peter's selfish desire to wipe his hands of the matter was a key difference from Goblin's Spider-Man, who would have risked his life to save an enemy rather than let them die. To Goblin, MCU Peter proved to be weaker in spirit than his Peter. His monologue also affected Electro and Sandman and turned them against Peter when they initially accepted his help. This scene proved Goblin to be not just a savage villain but a cold manipulator who knows his enemy better than he knows himself.
2 Green Goblin's Demise - Spider-Man (2002)
After revealing his identity to Peter in the climax of their final battle, Green Goblin uses the distraction as a way to finally kill his arch-nemesis. Activating his glider, he prepares to have Peter skewered from behind, but the hero's spider sense alerts him to the danger and allows him to dodge. Still, his instinctive reaction prevents him from saving Norman from getting impaled instead. Norman assumes control of his body for the last time and makes a final request to Peter to not tell his son Harry. Norman's death would haunt Peter ever since as he would always wonder if he could have saved him. Peter would get his chance at redeeming the fateful moment in No Way Home when he stopped MCU Peter from murdering his nemesis, only to be stabbed himself for his trouble. Norman's death would haunt Harry Osborn as well. Having witnessed Spider-Man deliver Norman's lifeless body back home, Harry would spend the following two films plotting his revenge and would ultimately take up the Green Goblin mantle to do so.
1 Creating Spider-Man
There's a reason why Green Goblin is Spider-Man's arch-enemy. No one pushes him to the limit or makes him doubt himself more. In both the 2002 and 2021 films, Norman attacks Peter at his heart by going after his loved ones. In both of these cases, Peter struggled to balance his hero and personal lives. Goblin saw this in both films and attacked it. "Peter, you're struggling to have everything you want while the world tries to make you choose,"—that is what Green Goblin said right before he killed May in No Way Home. This latest adventure saw the closest Goblin had come to breaking Spider-Man. Peter almost broke his hero's code by killing the villain but was talked out of it by Peters from separate universes and convinced to honor May's wish to help others. In both the Raimi film and No Way Home, the struggles end with both Peters ultimately realizing that they can't balance their lives as Spider-Man with their lives as ordinary citizens. They either had to pick one or the other. Green Goblin going after everyone they cared about showed them the importance of remaining anonymous. For MCU Peter, the Goblin forced him to give up everyone he loved for their safety and devote himself to fighting crime, effectively turning him into the hero everyone knew and loved from the Marvel comic books.