Reviews Film / The Amazing Spiderman 2

Just because people don't like it doesn't mean the reviews are mean-spirited. Sometimes a person can dislike something without being mean-spirited about it. And frankly, I think the reason it's getting worse reception than Spider-Man 3 is because a lot of critics are noticing that it doesn't have the spirit of the comics, the essence that made us love reading about Spider-Man. It's not a formula you can duplicate simply by including references and events from the comics, which these movies don't seem to get. While the Raimi films differed from the comics many times, they were true in every way that mattered (except the Sandman/Uncle Ben retcon, but I'll forgive them that one big mistake). While the Webb films differed from the comics, they were true in ways that don't really have any meaning. If you disagree with me, that's fine, I'm glad you liked it. But to most of us, these seem to be movie-making by accounting, and that's not what Spider-Man deserves.

I'm not convinced that if everyone didn't actually know that it was made by movie-accounting that they'd feel like that. The problems people are having with the new version tend to be small stylistic choices or a not completely rock solid script.

Compare that to Spiderman 3 where half the events felt incredibly exec mandated because 'venom' is cool. That film didn't even begin to know what it wanted to do.

The other changes the people feel are 'not true to the spirit', like Oscorp being responsible for everything, the focus on the Sinister Six etc, are exactly the same things that The Spectacular Spiderman cartoon did, and that's easily the best Spiderman cartoon despite the competition being hard. If someone went into the film blind their impressions would be very different, that's why so many of the reviews always end up talking at length about the production circumstances surrounding Amazing Spiderman

heck this is up to and including Peter Parker no longer being the 'Nerds are people who wear thick glasses right' Raimi thing. Nerds are defined by their passions and Raimi only ever let anything even slightly none superficial into Spiderman 2 (another reason why that film is amazing!). In the Spectacular Spiderman Peter Parker has a good group of friends and doesn't get into 1980's 'nerd' hijinks, but he still feels like the real Peter Parker.

(Incidentally, someone made a really good case that Peter Parker always works better as a journalism geek (with a science bent) than a science one. I'm still thinking about it but it has a lot of good points when you consider the way Peter Parker goes about his life and the way Spiderman fights crime)

I have seen some reviews be mean spirited, unlike you. Thank you for presenting your opposing opinion in a respectful manner, Picard! If the detractors of this film were more like you, I would have less of a problem with the negative reception.

No problem, and again, I'm really happy that you enjoyed it. Also, to reply to Tom With No Numbers, I think we can all agree that Spectacular was the best Spider-Man adaptation ever. No other adaptation I've seen really nailed the spirit of the Lee/Ditko era like it did, and it was glorious.

Yeah, I love Spectacular. That show WAS my childhood. Fuck Ultimate.

I don't have too much of a problem with individual scenes. When Garfield is being Peter he really mumbles badly through his lines in a way I feel Peter wouldn't (and even if he would, it doesn't work on the big screen). I like somewhat how he is as Spiderman. I enjoyed the fights between him and Electro. There are good individual moments.

But the result is a mess. Orcman and Kurzi seem to have a writing process that consists of coming up with individual cool scenes and then stringing them together in some semblance of a plot (See Transformers and Star Trek) . Only this time they failed utterly at the "stringing it together" part. I like their passion for cool moments but they need to be reined in by a writer who understands how to turn it all into a good story. Spiderman could have had a much greater impact if the coolness had the logical and emotional context that a good plot with consistent themes provides.

Am I the only one who loved it? I feel like I'm alone here.

I did ... kind of. I definitely found it superior to Winter Soldier, but it's still a 7/10 or 7.5/10 film for me. I agree with methodoverload that the film felt rather disjointed, there still was enough cohesion for me to enjoy it overall (unlike, say, the Scott Pilgrim film, which I disliked immensely). Plus, the gods of box office were merciful enough to provide us with a complete counter-point a month later: the new Godzilla, which was very tight, very cohesive, imaginatively filmed ... and thematically empty, with its second half completely devoid of surprises and narrative development. Thus, the two films rank the same for me.

I think Winter Soldier is superior, but I still love TAS 2, minus the last 20 minutes.

I stopped taking Winter Soldier seriously after everyone was fine with a manhunt declared on Captain America for the flimsiest of reasons, when the film showed us a museum dedicated to him moments earlier. That, and the whole Nazi plot twist was a cheap attempt to have its cake and eat it too, and flushed all supposed moral ambiguity down the drain (not that it would've had much more without it, but that's for a separate review.)

I was fine with the closing section of the film (although the hospitals losing power and not having back-up generators was a pretty large oversight); if anything, the whole arc with Peter's parents was the real disappointment. That action sequence on a plane at the beginning wasn't needed, and created a real case of tonal dissonance with the upbeat chase after the truck. Similarly, the metro station Schizo Tech felt like something out of a Film/Transformers.