This has been a pretty fun year for me so far in terms of comic book characters. It wasn’t that long ago that a whole bunch of my favorite characters were killed off in short order. Cut to now, and most of them are back, and many of them are thriving. It was only a week or two ago that another one of my all-time favorite characters, the Mimic, returned to the pages of the X-Men. And now we can add one more making his big comeback!

I don’t want to say who above the fold, for fear of spoilers, but here’s a tease from the comic itself.

The return happens in this week’s Red Goblin #1. I’ve actually been anticipating this return because Goblin characters have been getting a real push lately. Norman Osborn is starring in a Gold Goblin mini-series. And now his grandson, Normie, is the new Red Goblin.

Surely that would mean a return of my favorite Goblin…and I was right!

Join me after the jump for the big reveal!

So the villain of the Red Goblin series is going to be none other than Phil Urich! He’s back from the dead! And he looks terrible, like some kind of crazy zombie.

This is just plain cool. Even if it’s not the best of circumstances, it’s always nice when my favorite comic book characters are brought back from their random deaths. Like I said, it happens a lot to my favorite comic book characters. That’s what happens when your favorites are all obscure nobodies who are easily slaughtered for tension and to make other characters seem tougher.

So who is Phil Urich and why does he matter to me?

Once upon a time, in the 1990s, Phil was introduced and starred in a 13-issue series about a heroic Green Goblin. Norman and Harry Osborn were both dead at the time, and Marvel revived the persona in a Peter Parker vein. Phil was a lonely, dorky dude who stumbled into some equipment and decided to make a go of it as a costumed superhero. It was a fun little series, and, most importantly, it was my entry point to collecting comics on my own on a regular basis.

Phil Urich was my Peter Parker. He was the nerdy, imperfect protagonist that really propelled me into collecting comics and reading more.

But it was a short-lived series, and Phil disappeared into obscurity for a long time. He was eventually brought back and and turned into a villain. He was the Hobgoblin for a while. He was the Goblin Knight. The Goblin King. Basically, he just kept getting revamped into more and more pathetic roles.

And then he was killed when Norman Osborn became the first Red Goblin. It was sad.

But now he’s back! And he’s some kind of zombie goblin. Perhaps he’ll be healed and back to some kind of normal by the end of Red Goblin. Or maybe they’ll kill him again. We’ll find out. I just like that he’s back.

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