The Spider-Man Retrospective Series - The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014)

Written In May 2014

 I feel betrayed… I went on and on about how great The Amazing Spider-Man is, I defended that movie from harsh critics, I told fellow fans of the Raimi series it’s really good and you should go see it, I even said the score isn’t that good but it’s still perfectly enjoyable, and what does the team behind these movies do? They let go of Alvin Sargent, who had some uncredited additions to David Koepp’s screenplay all the way back on the original Spider-Man movie with Tobey Maguire and Willem Dafoe, and then went on to be a credited screenwriter on Spider-Man 2-The Amazing Spider-Man, and they also let go of Steve Kloves who penned all EIGHT of the Harry Potter movies! And who do they replace them with.

These two assholes. Don’t know them? Maybe you’ll know their names, Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci. Still don’t know them. Well maybe their credits will sound familiar. The first two of Michael Bay’s Transformers movies and both of JJ Abrams’s Star Trek movies… Yep, these two got their talentless paws on SPIDER-MAN!

Thank GOD, Abrams didn’t decided to wheel them in for Star Wars - Episode VII!

Speaking of science fiction series with the word Star in them, let me ask you something. What do Benedict Cumberbatch and Emma Stone have in common? Why they were both in recent franchises that Kurtzman and Orci wrote and produced that had “secrets” in them that were poorly hidden in advertising. Every fan left and right theorized last year that Cumberbatch was Khan, and what happened? It turns out he was Khan all along and everyone lied… Poorly! And with this movie? Every single person online was theorizing that Gwen would die in the second movie. Hell, everyone was theorizing that the minute Peter whispered to the poor girl that the promises you can’t keep are the best kind and then she smiled at what he was implying. And then the infamous set photos started coming out, and there were two things that really got people’s heads spinning.

Shailine Woodley as Mary-Jane Watson. Why did this get people chatting? Because they thought she wasn’t “hot” enough.

The other was this picture of Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy.

Why did this get people chatting, because these are the exact same clothes Gwen Stacy wore in the comics…

The night she died!

I, despite my better judgement, concluded that they wouldn’t actually kill her and it would be a fake out. But then this trailer came out and it hinted at one particular thing. They showed Gwen in that costume I just showed you on top of some kind of giant gear looking rather frightened, and then they showed Peter as Spider-Man, but without his mask on, screaming bloody murder. Gwen in the outfit she wore when she died in 1973 and Peter screaming in agony. Gee! I wonder what that could mean! And so then I came to the conclusion that they were going to kill her, but they shouldn’t. And what did they do?

DEAD!

There were so many things you could’ve done with this character, with this actress, but instead you’re going to just kill her off? What the hell man!

But since I told you that much, I might as well tell you what else happens.

Plot Summary Taken From Wikipedia:

Scientist Richard Parker records a video message to explain his disappearance. Later, he and his wife, Mary, are aboard a private jet hijacked by a man sent to assassinate Richard. With the pilot dead, the plane crashes.

In the present, Richard’s son Peter continues to fight crime as Spider-Man. He pursues and apprehends Aleksei Sytsevich, who attempted to steal a truck containing plutonium vials. During the chase, Spider-Man rescues OsCorp Industries employee Max Dillon. While speaking by phone with Gwen Stacy, Peter sees a vision of her father, police captain George Stacy, reminding him to leave Gwen out of it. Afterward, Peter meets with Gwen at their high school graduation ceremony, but insists he needs to keep his vow to her father and ends their relationship.

Peter’s childhood friend Harry Osborn returns to Manhattan to see his terminally ill father Norman, CEO of OsCorp. Norman explains his illness is hereditary, and Harry is at the age where it first develops. Norman gives Harry a small device he claims contains his life’s work. The next day, Norman dies and Harry is appointed the new OsCorp CEO. He humiliates the OsCorp board, which has been privy to Norman’s secret biogenetic projects for foreign military powers.

Thinking that they have become friends, Max idolizes Spider-Man. While tending to some maintenance in an OsCorp laboratory, he loses his balance and falls into a tank of genetically modified electric eels. They attack him, and he mutates into a living electric generator. Meanwhile, Peter attempts to maintain a friendship with Gwen, but she reveals she may move to England for school. Before they can discuss it, Max wanders into Times Square and accidentally causes a blackout. Spider-Man attempts to calm him down, but the police fire at Max, making him lose his temper and attack. Spider-Man eventually stops him, and Max is taken toRavencroft Institute.

The first symptoms of Harry’s illness show, and he uses the device Norman gave him to deduce that Spider-Man’s blood could help save him. He asks Peter, who has been selling photos of Spider-Man to the Daily Bugle, for help finding Spider-Man. Peter refuses, unsure of what effects the transfusion would have. The OsCorp board-members frame Harry for covering up Max’s accident, and remove him as CEO. Harry’s assistant, Felicia, informs him of equipment that could help him, so he makes a deal with Max (now calling himself Electro) to get him back inside the OsCorp building. There he finds a suit of armor and other equipment made by Norman, as well as venom from the now-destroyed genetically altered spiders. Instead of curing him, they transform him into a hideous, goblin-like creature.

Peter uses information left by his father to locate the video message in an abandoned subway station’s hidden lab. Richard explains he had to leave because he refused to cooperate with Norman Osborn’s biogenetic weaponization plans. Peter then hears a voicemail from Gwen, telling him she was offered the scholarship in England and is heading to the airport earlier than expected. He manages to catch her and professes his love for her, and they agree to go to England together. Electro causes another blackout, and Peter heads off to fight him. Gwen follows, and together they restore power and overload Electro’s body, killing him. Afterward, the transformed Harry arrives equipped with Norman’s armor and weaponry; upon seeing Gwen, Harry deduces Spider-Man’s true identity and, swearing revenge for being refused the blood transfusion, kidnaps her. He fights Spider-Man at the top of a clock tower. Spider-Man subdues Harry, but Gwen falls to her death, despite Spider-Man’s attempt to save her.

Five months later, Peter has given up being Spider-Man and often visits Gwen’s grave. Harry is healing from his transformations, and his associate Gustav Fiers (the “man in the shadows” from the first film) breaks Sytsevich out of prison and equips him with an electromechanical suit of armor. Calling himself the Rhino, he rampages through the streets. But a recording of Gwen’s graduation speech inspires Peter to return as Spider-Man and fight him.

Okay, let me preface this. I did enjoy this movie, but I have to say, it’s been my least enjoyable film of the franchise. I’ve seen worse superhero movies, and in fact, I’ve seen worse movies based on Marvel characters, but this is pretty fucking weak. Not just for Gwen’s stupid demise. BUT! There is still plenty to enjoy about this movie, this is not a movie so awful that it’ll have a longer list of cons than pros and that I feel the need to address the cons first. It’s still a pretty entertaining movie, but you may want turn your brain off on this one… And prepare yourself for anger when you realize Orci is writing a planned Venom movie with Kurtzman to direct…

But on the brighter side, it’s being cowritten by the writer of Men In Black and the Bill & Ted movies, with Drew Goddard, who did cowrote and directed Cabin In The Woods, set to writer and MAYBE direct The Sinister Six. So we may be in luck…

Keep in mind I said maybe though.

PROS:

• Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, and Sally Field are still great in their returning roles! Although between the three of them, Emma gets the least showy improvement. If you complained about Andrew’s Spidey still not getting enough jokes out, you’re needs will be more than satiated here. As for Sally? Well as Martin from Double Toasted put it at one point it seems like Sally forgot she was making a Spider-Man movie and gives a genuinely moving performance. Great job Mrs. Field!
• Paul Giamatti makes a delightfully (and intentionally) hammy performance as Aleksei Sytsevich AKA The Rhino. You know how a lot of actors play their Russian accents like this really low toned murmur but it sounds like their threatening you, Giamatti opts for the classic over the top angry and mocking kind of accent where he’s always going on and on about he’s going to crush you. When he gets into the actual rhino suit, it’s a delight to see Paul just trash the streets of New York! I know some folks are pissed they went with the robot suit, but I think it works. It’s also a little bit refreshing to see a bad guy in this franchise, who doesn’t become a bad guy because he goes crazy or because he hates spider-man, he was already a bad guy when he met spidey and was still a bad guy after he met him.
• Jamie Foxx’s Electro, in my opinion, doesn’t suffer from a poor motivation or characterization that turns on a dime, because it’s pretty clear this guy was already a bit off before his accident, so it makes sense that this accident would only emphasize that. It makes sense to me that the guy would feel betrayed by Spider-Man, in that, it doesn’t actually make any sense. By which I mean I, a presumably rational person, do not understand why someone would feel betrayed by their idol for simply not remembering my name after one encounter, so much so that they would want to kill them violently. BUT on the other hand, this guy is clearly already mentally ill, I can understand that this guy is making his own rationalizations for his own eschewed worldview. And that aside, while I personally didn’t care for the angle they took with him later, Foxx’s initial scene as Max Dillon is actually kind of heartwarming. The idea of this guy, who feels trampled upon daily, actually being made to feel important is kind of nice. And when he becomes Electro, good fuckity hell is he intimidating! I don’t think he’s the best villain of this franchise, but I think I rank him between Church’s Sandman and Giamatti’s Rhino, with Venom and the two Harrys in 7th, 8th and 9th place. The physical look of Electro is extremely well done as well, four for the guys on SFX team, you guys earned it!
• He’s only in the movie for five minutes, but Chris Cooper makes for a pretty good turn as Norman Osborn. He’s sufficiently creepy and he has the right mix of a critical attitude toward his son while also coming off like he genuinely cares for him.
• Dane DeHaan’s a better Harry than James Franco ever was, he has some great moments here, but he doesn’t get enough time to really properly show what he’s got. Undoubtedly though are his scenes from about the moment where he’s let go from the company to about the moment he teams up with Electro.
• Colm Feore doesn’t do a ton in the movie, but he’s a welcome presence and very enjoyable to watch,
• We finally figure out more of what that damn mystery they teased to us in Amazing Spider-Man 1 was! Thank you!
• Hans Zimmer does some of his best work here in collaboration with the Magnificent Six, who include the musicians, Pharrell Williams, Johnny Marr of the Smiths, Mike Einziger of Incubus, electronic artist, Junkie XL (who previously did music for this year’s 300: Rise of an Empire and Divergent), and up and coming composers, Steve Mazzaro (who previously did music for last year’s Bullet To The Head, starring Sylvester Stallone, Jason Momoa, and Sung Kang) and Andrew Kawczynzki. This arguably the best score ever made for a Spider-Man movie, it sounds so awesome! Give this theme a listen, it’s shorter than Elfman and Horner’s but it’s go such a great sound to it! But the real fun tune is Electro’s theme, they already showed a bit of it in the trailers with having Pharrell constantly going “Paranoia paranoia paranoia paranoia paranoia” whenever you see Electro on screen.
• They didn’t do it well, but I like the idea of Peter always seeing Captain Stacy whenever he’s with Gwen. You can tell it’s still on his mind that the Captain made him promise to leave Gwen out of his affairs and he’s breaking that promise.

CONS:

• Gwen Stacy’s death is the most telegraphed demise I’ve ever fucking seen in a cinema in my entire life. On graduation day she makes her valedictorian she makes a speech about how you live your life, then when Peter’s angsting about his failed relationship he listens to “Gone, Gone, Gone” by Philip Philips. Don’t know it? Well the chorus of the tune is “And I would do it for you, for you. Baby, I’m not moving on I love you long after you’re gone. For you, for you. You will never sleep alone. I love you long after you’re gone And long after you’re gone, gone, gone.“ Although, that’s not even what really pissed me off about that scene though. Raimi used popular music in his movies too, but you know what music he used? He used music that had already stood the test of time. These were songs people already kind of knew even if they were kind of old. Like the sequence in Raimi’s Spider-Man 2 where Peter just tries to go about his day as an ordinary schlub, after having given up being Spider-Man, they played "Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head” by BJ Thomas. I’m not gonna criticize Philip Philips or his song, I’m just saying, if you had to have that useless scene did you have to be playing a Billboard Top 40 hit? Couldn’t you have played something less recent or actually fit the scene?
• You might recall that earlier in the week, I made an early jab at this movie for basically aping the same origin story as Jim Carrey’s Riddler in Batman Forever, you know, nerd worships hero, nerd feels betrayed by hero, nerd becomes a bad guy because they now hate the hero. Only this time, it doesn’t seem like they’re doing that for a reason. The Incredibles, like a lot of Pixar films, had dozens upon dozens of references to other members of it’s genre. One of which, was the origin of the riddler. They were spoofing it. in Iron Man 3, the entire movie was in part an homage to 90’s action comedies, mostly because the director and cowriter of the movie is Shane Black, who wrote Lethal Weapon and The Last Action Hero. Here though, I don’t get it. It seems like they’re playing it sincerely, like you’re actually supposed to feel bad for this stalker guy when he becomes a super villain. It wasn’t even sincere when they first did in Batman Forever! They were playing it as a joke because it was Jim Carrey, and the fact both of Joel Schumacher’s Batman movies were supposed to be goofy comedies in the vein of basically Adam West’s Batman but 30 years later! Did you really think people were going to take this seriously? Because I certainly don’t!
• You know how I said Peter was basically seeing Captain Stacy all the time and that they didn’t do it well? Here’s why. The entire fucking time he’s just standing there staring at Peter in disapproval. Why? The visions of Uncle Ben worked in Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man sequels is because A. They did something different each time. And B. It was Uncle Ben actually telling Peter something or Peter visualizing something that might’ve happened. In Spider-Man 2 when Peter tells Uncle Ben that he is Spider-Man No More, it’s effective because it was Ben saying Peter needs to just power through and keep fighting the good fight, but Peter won’t listen because he’s tired of his life being shit. It’s like the moment in Batman: Mask of the Phantasm where Bruce is in front of his mother and father’s grave and he’s telling them that he can’t be Batman after all, because it’s different now, he’s happy with his life and he never foresaw that. Here, it’s not dramatic, it’s just stupid.
• Here’s another ding against Electro. During the incident at Time Square, we see Max transition into Electro, the change to villainy is pretty believable in my opinion at least. I can also buy that after being tortured and held captive for so long Max’s personality would become more sinister, but what I don’t buy is how suddenly Electro’s manner of speaking becomes totally different. He tells the scientists who torture him that they’d “better make damn sure” that they kill him this time or else he’ll be the one killing them, then later he tells Spider-Man during their final fight that he’ll be like a god to the people of New York. Where did these delusions of grandeur come from? I mean I guess they’re not delusions seeing as how, he has the ability to do that, but why does he suddenly have the desire to become like a god? I don’t get it.
• What was the point of shoehorning Green Goblin? Was it just to kill Gwen? Was it to set up for Sinister Six? Couldn’t you have done that in Part 3? He doesn’t really do anything and Harry’s back to normal at the end of the movie, and while he was here, he wasn’t all that scary.
• It feels too soon to kill Gwen. They should’ve waited for the third movie to pull that trigger. I feel like that way we would’ve known Gwen well enough to just be sad instead of feeling kind of cheated because we barely knew her at this rate.
• You know what Peter did after Gwen died? He sat in front of his girlfriend’s grave for five months… He didn’t throw himself into his heroics to honor her, he just sat down and waited until the combination of a peptalk from Aunt May, a posthumous message from Gwen, and when rhino showing up and started wrecking shit. Some hero you turned out to be Parker.
• I really hate how it’s most blatantly obvious that Aunt May knows Peter is Spidey and yet Peter is blissfully unaware of that fact and won’t just come out and tell her.
• The little kid at the end. I get what they were going for here, and I’m aware that this was actually Andrew’s idea, so I’ll not to be too harsh here, but I’m sorry dude, this just doesn’t work. The little kid just standing there while this homicidal gangster in a robot suit does nothing but mock him? No, in real life that could would be fucking dead. I’m sorry. I’m not saying the kid should’ve died, that’s not at all what I think should’ve happened. Here’s my idea, the little kid walks up to the Rhino, the Rhino fires in his direction to scare him, then it looks like Rhino’s actually gonna shoot him this time and Spidey sweeps in at the last second. No bantering, just getting to business because there are lives at stake.

All in all, this one was a disappointment. There are worse movies out right now that you could see. And there are going to be much worse movies out later this year, am I right Michael?

Yeah, that’s gonna suck a lot worse than anything this movie has to offer. So look, if you still want to see it, don’t let me discourage you. Go see it. See it in 3D or IMAX if you want! It deserves that treatment! But for, this was a big letdown. What folks thought of Man of Steel last year is what I think of this movie now. I’m gonna give The Amazing Spider-Man 2 a 6.2 out of 10.

I’ll be back on some other day to review some other thing. For now though I’m just gonna call it a day.

The Spider-Man Retrospective Series - The Amazing Spider-Man (2012)

Written In May 2014

Plot Summary Taken From Wikipedia:

A young Peter Parker discovers his father Richard Parker’s study has been burgled. Gathering up hidden documents, Peter’s parents take him to the home of his Aunt May (Sally Field) and Uncle Ben (Martin Sheen), then mysteriously depart.

Years later, a teenaged Peter (Andrew Garfield) attends Midtown Science High School, where he is bullied by Flash Thompson (Chris Zylka) and has caught the eye of the beautiful Gwen Stacy(Emma Stone). At home, Peter finds his father’s papers and learns he worked with fellow scientist Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans) at Oscorp. Sneaking into Oscorp, Peter enters a lab where a “biocable” is under development from genetically modified spiders, one of which bites him. On the subway ride home, he discovers that he has developed spider-like abilities.

After studying Richard’s papers, Peter visits the one-armed Connors, reveals he is Richard Parker’s son and gives Connors his father’s “decay rate algorithm”, the missing piece in Connors’ experiments on regenerating limbs. Connors is being pressed by his superior, Dr. Ratha (Irrfan Khan), to devise a cure for the dying (but unseen) head of Oscorp, Norman Osborn. In school, Peter gets into trouble after a basketball challenge with Flash in which Peter accidentally shatters the backboard glass. His uncle changes work shifts to meet with the principal and asks Peter to replace him walking home with Aunt May that night. Peter gets distracted and helps Connors regenerate the limb of a laboratory mouse. Peter’s failure causes an argument with his uncle and he leaves. At a nearby deli, a cashier refuses to let Peter buy a chocolate milk since Peter is two cents short; when a thief suddenly raids the store, Peter indifferently observes. While searching for Peter, Uncle Ben attempts to stop the thief and is killed. The thief escapes as Peter finds Ben on the sidewalk.

Afterward, Peter uses his new abilities to hunt criminals matching the killer’s description. After a fall lands him inside an abandoned gym, a luchador-wrestling poster inspires him to create a mask to hide his identity. He adds a spandex suit and builds mechanical devices to attach to his wrists to shoot a biocable “web”. Peter accepts a dinner invitation from Gwen, where he meets and has a tense conversation with her father, police captain George Stacy (Dennis Leary), over Spider-Man’s motives. After dinner, Peter reveals his identity to Gwen and they kiss.

After seeing success with the mouse using lizardDNA, Ratha demands Connors begin human trials immediately if Osborn is to survive. Connors refuses to rush the drug-testing procedure and put innocent people at risk. Ratha fires Connors and decides to test Connors’ serum at a VA hospital under the guise of a flu shot. In an act of desperation, Connors tries the formula on himself. After passing out, he awakens to find his missing arm has regenerated. Discovering that Ratha is on his way to the VA hospital, Connors, whose skin is turning green and scaly, goes to intercept him. By the time he gets to the Williamsburg Bridge Connors has become a violent hybrid of lizard and man, tossing cars, including Ratha’s, over the side of the bridge. Peter, now calling himself Spider-Man, snatches each falling car with his web-lines.

Spider-Man suspects Connors is Lizard and unsuccessfully confronts the creature in the sewers. Lizard learns Spider-Man’s real identity via the name on an abandoned camera and follows Peter to school where they fight. In response, the police start a manhunt for both Spider-Man and Lizard. The police corner Spider-Man and Captain Stacy discovers that he is really Peter. Lizard plans to make all humans lizard-like by releasing a chemical cloud from Oscorp’s tower, to eliminate the weaknesses he believes plague humanity. Spider-Man confronts and battles the Lizard on the roof of Oscorp Tower and eventually disperses an antidote cloud instead, restoring Connors and earlier victims to normal, but not before Lizard mortally wounds Captain Stacy. Before his death, Captain Stacy makes Peter vow to keep Gwen safe by leaving her out of it. Peter initially does so by avoiding to go to Captain Stacey’s funeral, but later at school suggests to Gwen he may see her again.

In a closing-credits scene, Connors, in a prison cell, speaks with a man in the shadows who asks if Peter knows the truth about his father. Connors replies, “No”, and demands Peter be left alone before the man disappears.

Nothing anyone says or does is gonna make Spider-Man 4 happen. I’ve heard some fans talk about the idea of the two Spider-Men being in a movie together, which I’d love to see happen, but let’s face it folks, It won’t. You know what’s gonna happen when The Amazing Spider-Man 2 makes it’s money back, they’re gonna start pre-production on The Amazing Spider-Man 3. And you know what they’re gonna do if Marc Webb and Andrew Garfield don’t come back for Part 4? They’ll either recast or re-reboot. Unless TASM3 tanks at the box office so much that they have to sell the rights back to Marvel to make a profit on it. But that probably won’t happen because superhero movies are the in thing right now.

And regardless of whether or not we like the fact that we’ll have to see Peter Parker get bit by a different spider every few years, what we can accept is that right now, this reboot ain’t half bad. In fact, it’s pretty good. In fact, I’d say it’s better than Spider-Man 3. Not kind of better, but not a lot better, just… Better. Regardless of the behind the scenes stuff, this movie justifies it’s own existence. The movie looks us fans of the Raimi movies dead in the eye, and says, to quote Rhodey in Iron Man 2, “It’s me, and I’m here, so get over it and move on!”

I think the best way to put it is to actually get into my review, time for the pros and cons.

PROS:

• Andrew Garfield, this guy has said in every interview he’s ever done about Spider-Man that he adores the character, you can see the guy is having an absolute BALL! Playing this character! He brings such joy to the role that you just can’t help but adore every second you see his precious face. His joy is almost infectious, you just smile big whenever you see him as Spider-Man being Spider-Man! It’s energetic performance that even shines through in the more dramatic segments, such as when he and Uncle Ben are getting into it when Ben mentions that his father had personal philosophy about responsibility and Peter asks him where is his father, and even comments if responsibility was so important to him why the hell isn’t he here telling him why it’s important. Why the hell is his father not here. When I go see the sequel on my birthday, I shall not be wearing my “Fuck You Flip-Flops.”
• Emma Stone. Is there anything this girl can’t do? She is just delightful as Gwen, it’s not even that the character on the page is any good, not to discredit the writers, but it is purely Emma’s own energy and charm that makes this character great. I think if someone else had played this character, we may have had less of a rival for Kirsten’s Mary-Jane, and more of a rival to Mary-Sue. Again, not because the character is poorly written, but she’s made to be that sort of “I’m perfect at everything.” Type of character. She’s implied to the top of her class (I say implied because it’s never explicitly said, but she does note that Peter is SECOND in his class and she does have an internship at a major science research corporation and under the tutelage of a well respected scientist who has his own Wikipedia page, while also being one of the most popular and beautiful girls in her school, and is the only woman amazing enough to win the main hero’s affection. But guess what? Emma Stone destroys the very possibility that you could call this character here a Mary-Sue.
• I get the feeling, from the behind the scenes material, that Rhys Ifans was mailing it in as Doctor Conners/The Lizard, but if he truly was, then I’d file Rhys under “Actors Who Can Pull Fantastical Roles Despite Phoning It In!” Other actors I would put in are Alec Guinness as Ben Kenobi in the original Star Wars trilogy, Alan Rickman in anything, and Anthony Hopkins in the first Thor. He is incredibly likable when he first appears as Dr. Conners, and you even sort of get how incomplete he feels without his other arm. I don’t recall ever knowing an amputee, and I’m certainly not one myself, otherwise typing this would be even more difficult than getting you to actually care about what I think. But, I really get the feeling that this is the kind of guy who can maintain the sheen of a someone who has it all figured out, when in actuality they’re kind of broken and hoping to be fixed. And when he becomes The Lizard, good God is this guy intimidating. I can honestly say that while I don’t think he was as entertaining as Dafoe’s Goblin, sympathetic as Church’s Sandman, intriguing as Molina’s Doc Ock, or even as visually unnerving as Grace’s Venom, he is definitely the most intimidating and physically threatening of Spidey’s cinematic villains. And when he’s just not being the Lizard but still hopped on the serum, he’s a clearly unnerving presence, what with his going on about how pathetic normal humans are and such. And when he gets to finally turn it off after being cured, he seems genuinely appalled by what his actions have wrought. When he helps Peter back onto the building while falling, he takes a very brief moment to go over what just happened, then in horror he realizes he just killed a man. And not only did he kill any man, he killed a police captain who was the father of his best student! And his final scene, in the admittedly underwhelming post credits scene, you really feel his indignation when he tells the man in the shadows to leave Peter the hell alone.
• Dennis Leary as Captain George Stacy. This is fucking perfect casting for a smaller role, I haven’t seen a movie cop this good since… Well… Gary Oldman as Commissioner Gordon. He makes for a great cop and makes for a great cop dad. Also, I have a police detective for a close family member (my uncle) and Dennis kind of gives me a similar vibe as well. I thought a great highlight of him was his final scene where he tells Peter that he’s a good kid who’s bound to become a great man, but being a great man means making enemies, and having enemies means endangered loved ones, and endangered loved ones means him being with his daughter means he could end getting her killed. And so he tells her, leave her out of this.
• Martin Sheen. You know, I’m pretty sure this is still the only role I’ve seen Martin Sheen in and at the time I heard he was playing uncle Ben I didn’t know of his well known or well respected roles. At that point my only real thought was “The guy who raised the man who always says ‘winning’ is our new Uncle Ben, what could possibly go wrong?” Turns out, nothing went wrong. The guy was fantastic!
• Sally Field is terrific as Aunt May, seeing her here makes really reconsider if I would honestly call Rosemary the definitive May Parker because Goddamn does this woman feel motherly! She could give fucking Katara from Avatar a run for her money!
• Irrfan Khan pops for a little bit in this movie, he doesn’t really do much, but it’s neat to see a well respected Indian actor wear a suit and act like he’s the evil emperor’s messenger. And no, I’m not gonna make a Life of Pi joke because everyone else has already. Yes, it’s funny that Irrfan was in both movies and that the tiger’s name is Richard Parker which also happens to be the same as Peter’s father. I get it.
• I don’t normally bring up Stan Lee’s cameo in these movies but this one was just freaking hilarious! It’s not even great because it’s Stan Lee, although that does add to it, it’s also just so funny because it’s some old guy jamming to his classical music while right behind him are two comic book characters dooking it out.
• Young actor Chris Zylka does a pretty good job in a bit role as Peter’s high school tormentor/good friend, Flash Thompson, he’s done pretty much nothing I want to address due to either insignificance or my genuine distaste for, this guy show’s some real good chops and actually serves to make the character human, where as he’d previously just been relegated to an asshole with bigger muscles than Peter in the original Raimi film.
• Stone and Garfield have such amazing chemistry on screen, it’s really unsurprising when you realize that these two are actually in love in real life. The scene that actually convinced me to see this movie was a clip of Peter sort of babbling to Gwen trying to ask her out of on a date and some Gwen seems to realize what he’s saying and says yes. As she walks away to go about her own business, Peter does a little fist pump and then walks off his own way and does a little skip. It was so adorable.
• I previously said that I think Spider-Man 3 has the best action of the series. I stand corrected, THIS is the best action of the series. The production outright made it a point to rely on the actual actors and stunt guys and much less CG which is some that I greatly appreciate. I haven’t commented on it before, but there were times during the Raimi films where the midair sequences looked something out of the fucking Polar Express! But even then, they do really inventive things with the webbing that previously hadn’t been done in the other movies. Like when Peter outright wraps Conners as the Lizard up into a web like an actual Spider would it’s pray. It’s pretty inventive stuff really.
• James Horner’s score is kind of a mixed bag, there’s parts of it that I think are pretty good, and parts that really aren’t, but I do encourage you to give the theme a listen. It’s not quite as good as Elfman’s theme, but it’s pretty fun to listen to.

CONS:

• How the fuck does no one at Peter’s school talk about the fact that he threw a football so hard that it hit the goal post and actually dented it or the fact that he grabbed the basket on the basketball hoop so hard he broke the actual board!
• Kick. The. Gun! If you see a dangerous looking man trip and drop his weapon, don’t try to take it from him, make it so that he just can’t get to it. Ben, I know you don’t claim to be a smart man, but you’d have to be mentally impaired to actually believe it was a good idea to wrestle for the gun with the guy!
• “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” “But those are the best kind.”
• I know the guy behind the clerk bruised your ego Peter, but are you really so petty as to let the actual store lose money because the guy wouldn’t give you your chocolate milk? You fucking douche.
• The vigilante story arc I don’t get. Peter’s motivator has never been vengeance, it’s always been guilt. When Peter sees this crook’s face and sees that son of a bitch who killed his uncle is the same guy he let get away, he’s supposed to feel like a piece of shit. He’s supposed to realize that him being selfish cost his uncle’s life. Instead, it comes off almost like Peter feels betrayed or something. I helped this guy and then he kills my uncle, what the fuck!?!?

All in all, I’d say this was the start to a great new series. I don’t have many dislikes, and another point that I like, that I hand’t mentioned earlier, is the fact that this is a new director! This is Marc Webb’s second movie ever, before this he’d done a romantic comedy called (500) Days of Summer with JGL and Zooey Deschanel and a bunch of music videos, which are actually some of my favorite videos.

My Chemical Romance’s I’m Not Okay, Helena, Ghost Of You, and Teenagers, Green Day’s 21 Guns, and All American Rejects’ Move Along and Gives You Hell. This guy is a promising talent, and so are Emma and Andrew, if these movies don’t work out ultimately, I really hope that these guys all manage to get work elsewhere.

I’m gonna give The Amazing Spider-Man an 8.1 out of 10.