Warning: SPOILERS for Ruins of Ravencroft: Dracula #1.
Spider-Man’s arch-nemesis Norman Osborn has a new vocation - as a consultant at the Ravencroft Institute for the Criminally Insane. Norman Osborn, aka the Green Goblin, was originally just a Spider-Man villain. But it’s been a long time since he was restricted to that role; he’s now viewed as one of Marvel’s premiere bad guys.
Osborn is both a schemer and an opportunist, and that’s a dangerous combination. Once before, he managed to manipulate his way into a position of power; it started with leadership of the Thunderbolts project, and ended with him becoming one of the most powerful people in the world, in the famous “Dark Reign” era. Now, he’s playing his games again, taking advantage of the events of Absolute Carnage to give himself a fresh start.
Ruins of Ravencroft: Dracula #1 reveals that Osborn has now become a consultant at the Ravencroft Institute for the Criminally Insane. Although Ravencroft was destroyed in Absolute Carnage, it has been rebuilt. Osborn has blamed all his past crimes on the Carnage symbiote, and decided that Ravencroft is a good place to start building his new power base. That means pretending philanthropy, and starting a new career.
The Ruins of Ravencroft books have revealed the dark history of the Ravencroft Institute, which was built on cursed ground. Since the beginning, some of the Marvel Universe’s darkest scientists have used Ravencroft; the X-Men villain Mr. Sinister, the Weapon Plus program that would eventually create Wolverine. Now Osborn has positioned himself as the successor to Mr. Sinister and to Professor Andre Thorton, mastermind of the Weapon X Project. There are secret chambers beneath Ravencroft, and there’s no reason to assume they’ve all been uncovered; as well as the criminals imprisoned there for “treatment,” there are monstrous beings in the basement who have been abandoned since the 1940s. No doubt Osborn will use all this to his own ends.
Ruins of Ravencroft has been one of the best Marvel events in years, with writer Frank Tieri skillfully navigating his way through Marvel history and retconning Ravencroft into the stories of Captain America, Dracula, and even Werewolf By Night. In truth, though, all this really does is set the scene for what is to come; a five-issue Ravencroft miniseries that will presumably explore Norman Osborn’s role at Ravencroft, and chart his rise to power. It remains to be seen what Spider-Man’s greatest foe will do now he has another chance.
Ruins of Ravencroft: Dracula #1 is on sale now in comic book shops.
More: Marvel Remembers The ORIGINAL Captain America
