The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was meant to kickstart an ambitious cinematic universe by Sony. To achieve that, the movie featured multiple references to other characters from across Spider-Man's world, such as Vulture and Doctor Octopus. The movie was also supposed to feature a post-credits scene teasing the future of the franchise. Ultimately scrapped, the scene was going to center around Norman Osborn's detached head.
In the film, Osborn (Chris Cooper), died from his mysterious "goblin" disease, Retroviral Hyperplasia, but that was not meant to be the end of him. Shortly after the movie's release, pictures from the scrapped post-credits scene came out. The images show The Gentleman (Michael Massee) walking away from Norman Osborn's frozen head in Oscorp's "Special Projects" section. According to Screen Rant, Fiers was supposed to have said, "Wake up, old friend."
Now, purported picutres of the prop head used in the film have surfaced online. If real, it is... well, gruesome, to say the least. Facebook group Movie Props allows users to share and sell items from film productions. Recently, a user made a sales post of what they claim is Chris Cooper's Norman Osborn prop head from The Amazing Spifder-Man 2 (pictures below are from X):
The prop is listed for $5,000 USD, and though we can't verify its authenticity, the poster says the purchase includes a certificate of authenticity. Having said that, given its remarkably realistic design, it does appear to be legitimate. So far, the only looks we'd gotten at Norman's decapitated head were of it inside a cryogenic case. If real, the prop in these new pictures provides a much better idea of how gnarly Norman's "goblin" disease was.
The design is surprisingly gruesome, feeling, perhaps, a little too graphic for a superhero film, particularly one starring the Wall-Crawler. Of course, the head might not have been shown in that much detail had it appeared in the movie. But, even with that, it would have probably still given some younger viewers nightmares.
Now, if you're not caught up in the lore that was the, frankly, insanely awesome plans for The Amazing Spider-Man franchise, you might be pretty confused as to why the movie would use Norman Osborn's decapitated head as a plot point. Turns out, his detached appendage was supposed to play a big part in the franchise. Speaking to Den of Geek (via Screen Rant), The Amazing Spider-Man 2 director Marc Webb confirmed the third film in the series would have featured Norman Osborn's frozen head, and him ultimately coming back to life:
"Yeah, we were talking about the Sinister Six. They were going to make a Sinister Six movie before we did [The Amazing Spider-Man 3]. But I wanted... Chris Cooper was going to come back and play the Goblin. We were going to freeze his head, and then he was going to be brought back to life. And then there was that character called The Gentleman. We had some notions about how to do it, but I think maybe we were thinking too far ahead when we started building in those things. But it was a fun exercise. I look back very fondly on those days."
Webb then confirmed Osborn was meant to be the main villain in The Amazing Spider-Man 3: "Well, [Norman] was going to be the main villain. He was going to come out and lead the Sinister Six. We had talked about Vulture a little bit too, actually."
As maligned as The Amazing Spider-Man franchise is, its future plans sounded quite interesting. With these pictures showing Norman Osborn's purported head, one cannot help but get excited about what could have been had the saga continued.
What do you think about this purported look at Norman Osborn? Would you have liked to see his storyline play out in The Amazing Spider-Man series? Drop your thoughts in the comments!