Funny / Spider-Man 2

One gets the impression the Daily Bugle doesn't want this picture of Spider-Man...

• Jameson's epic reaction to Peter's request to be paid in advance: he cackles — for almost ten seconds straight, during which he looks at Peter then goes back to cackling even harder before finally stopping with:
  Jameson: You serious?! Pay you for what, standing there?
  • If you notice, Robbie is sitting there smiling to himself as if he's thinking, "Walked yourself right into that one, kid."
• "Pizza time!"
  • Beforehand, when Peter stumbles out of a broom closet, after taking web-swing transportation, and spends a painful amount of time trying to keep the brooms and mops from falling out with him, finally shutting the door on them. All the while the floor receptionist watches completely dumbfounded.
  • Earlier is Mr. Aziz's immortal dialogue:
    Mr. Aziz: You have to go 42 blocks, in 7 and a half minutes, or your ass is fired.
    [Peter just stands there]
    Mr. Aziz: GOOoooOOO!
• Following getting fired from his pizza delivery job, Peter goes to the Bugle and tries to sell some non-Spider Man photos to J. Jonah Jameson. Pretty much every single line Jameson has in the ensuing conversation is hilarious:
  Jameson: You're fired. [notices Peter is distracted] Parker, hello? You're fired!
  Peter: What? Why?
  Jameson: [looks at Peter's latest portfolio] Dogs catching Frisbees? Pigeons in the park? A couple of geezers playin' chess?
  Betty: [walks in urgently] Boss!
  Jameson: Not now. [Betty walks out]
  Peter: Well, I was thinking maybe the Bugle could show another side of New York for a change.
  Robbie: [comes in] We got six minutes to deadline, Jonah! We need page one!
  Jameson: [ignores Robbie] Parker, I don't pay ya to be a sensitive artiste! I pay you because... [notices Betty trying again to come in] Still not now! [Betty walks back out] ...I pay you because for some reason that psycho Spider-Man'll pose for you!
  Peter: Spider-Man won't let me take any more pictures! You've turned the whole city against him!
  Jameson: A fact I'm very proud of! Now, get your pretty little portfolio off my desk before I go into a diabetic coma! [Betty finally just calls his phone]
  Betty: Boss, your wife's on the line! She said she lost your checkbook!
  Jameson: Thanks for the good news! [turns off intercom]
  Peter: Mr. Jameson, please! Isn't there any of these shots you can use? I really need the money.
  Jameson: [with faux sympathetic "puppy-eyes" face] Aww... Miss Brant?!?
  Betty: [walks in] Yes?
  Jameson: Get me a violin!
  Robbie: Five minutes to deadline, Jonah!
  Jameson: All right, run a picture of a rancid chicken. Here's the headline: "Food Poisoning Scare Sweeps City!"
  Ted Hoffman: [leans in] Some food got poisoned?
  Jameson: [glares over] I'm a little nauseous, yah!^* This one's even funnier in the French Canadian dub, where he answers "Not just the food; your brain too!"
  Peter: [after a short pause] All right, Mr. Jameson. [he hands Jameson a photo of Spider-Man]
  Jameson: [briefly analyzes the photo] It stinks. Robbie, there's your Page 1: "Masked Menace Terrorizes Town!"
  Robbie: I told you he's not a menace!
  Jameson: And I told you...
  Robbie: I'll take care of it.
  Jameson: I'll give you $150.
  Peter: $300.
  Jameson: That's outrageous! [hands Peter his check] Done. Give this to the girl. Thank you. Buh-bye.
  • Particular note to Peter's completely deadpan rebuttal of the price. You can just tell from the disinterested way he says it that they've done this before and he knows it'll work.
  • Right as Peter leaves, Jameson grabs the phone and goes back to his usual shenanigans like nothing happened.
  • When Jameson tells her to get him a violin, Betty has this look on her face as if she is genuinely unsure if he's being serious or not before running out the office, presumably going to search for a violin just to be safe.
• Mr. Ditkovich. Full stop.
  • His Establishing Character Moment. Peter is headed back to his apartment. Mr. Ditkovich is partying in his house, with his door closed and he somehow senses Peter is coming, despite music loudly blaring inside:
    Mr. Ditkovich: RENT!
    [Peter stops dead on his tracks with a look that clearly screams This Is Gonna Suck]
    Peter: [smiles] Hi!
    Mr. Ditkovich: Hi. What’s hi? Can I spend it?
    Peter: Uh… I have a paycheck due this week…
    Mr. Ditkovich: You’re a month late again. Again!
    Peter: I promise as soon as I—
    Mr. Ditkovich: If promises were crackers, my daughter would be fat!
  • Peter reveals that at the moment all he has is 20 bucks that Aunt May gave him as a birthday present… which Mr. Ditkovich promptly snatches away from his hand.
  • Mr. Ditkovich’s Badass Boast:
    Mr. Ditkovich: Don’t try to sneak past me. I have ears like a cat and eyes like a rodent. [makes a snarly face]
    Peter: Thanks, Mr. Ditkovich.
  • Ursula says hi to Peter but accidentally messes up the dish she was preparing and her hard work catches fire. Peter looks on with a horrified expression as Mr. Ditkovich shuts the door on his face.
  • The next day, Peter is headed towards the bathroom. He politely knocks at the door to see if someone is using it. Then Mr. Ditkovich practically sleepwalks past Peter, enters the bathroom completely disregarding the possibility of it being occupied and slams the door on Peter’s face.
  • Moments later, he reopens the door and looks at Peter and asks “Rent?” Peter grabs the doorknob and closes the door on Mr. Ditkovich’s face.
  • When Peter is going to watch MJ's play, he rushes down the stairs to avoid Mr. Ditkovich. Sure enough, he too, rushes out of his house, with his pants down, yelling at Peter for his rent. Ursula walks out hearing the commotion and finds her father wearing boxers, complaining to her about Peter before realizing his pants are still down.
• The "Spider-Man rides the elevator" scene. Both the original version and the variant used in the extended cut.
• In the climactic scene, as Mary Jane discovers Peter is Spider-Man, a giant wall starts to fall on her. Peter catches it, grins at her, and says, "Hi!"
  • "This is... really heavy."
  • Also, his scream when the wall is about to fall on her. It's so Narmy that you just gotta love it.
• From the extended cut: JJ wears the Spidey Suit unaware that his coworkers are secretly watching him.
• The "Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head" montage.
  • His bike wheel breaks off, bounces out the window and hits a car below. Cue yells.
    Passerby: HEY! YOU PUNK!
    Peter: Um... sorry!
• Peter dodges a car by backflipping 10 feet into the air, does a Three-Point Landing, and notices some kids witnessed the whole thing.
  Kid: How'd you do that?
  Peter: Uhh... workout, plenty of rest. Y'know, eat your green vegetables!
  Kid 2: That's what my mom is always saying! I just never actually believed her!
  • Peter even has a "I can't believe that worked!" look on his face.
  • While the subsequent action scene is undeniably badass, it is kinda funny how easily Spider-Man defeats the two getaway robbers, who are armed to the teeth, mind you, by simply webbing them to a nearby street light post and then he proceeds to drive away in their getaway car (in the extended cut you see him get to the driver's seat and take off his mask). Sure enough, he arrives at MJ's play in that car.
  • A guard threatens to tow Peter's car if he parks where he did. Peter pauses for a while and then decides the hell with it since it’s not his car anyway and walks away.
• The spoof of his first attempt to come back to being Spider-Man.
  Peter: I'M BACK! [jumps, and falls into washing lines and lands on a car. He gets up and his back cracks loudly] MY BACK!
  • On top of that, the scene before had Peter saying to himself that he needed to have a "strong focus on what I want", before jumping off the roof. What car does Peter land on first? A Ford Focus.
  • Also the meta humor in the scene, as a bad back almost forced Tobey Maguire out of the film.
• In an interview on public radio, Bruce Campbell discusses his various roles in the films, playing up their importance for laughs. When discussing his usher role in this film, he jokingly brags that he "defeated Spider-Man."
  • Peter is forced to sit outside, wait for the play to be over and talk to MJ personally. As he is absent mindedly looking around, he notices a street musician play a song… her own rendition of the theme song from the 60s animated series. Cue a big WTF look on Peter’s face. By the time she’s finished, Peter has a You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me! look on his face.
  • Really, any time Tobey Maguire non-verbally reacts to Peter’s bad luck (which are Played for Laughs, at least) is a treat to watch.
• In the opening sequence, Peter is racing through busy Manhattan traffic trying to make a pizza delivery on an extremely tight time limit. With traffic really backed up, he ditches his bike, runs into an alleyway, quickly changes into Spider-Man, and then web-slings out of the alleyway, which is noticed by a bystander.
  Bystander: WHOOOA, HE STOLE THAT GUY'S PIZZAS!
• Aunt May kicking the loan guy, though she tried to kick Peter's leg when he was making a comment on her decision to give piano lessons, but she ends up aiming at the wrong guy. During the subsequent fight between Spidey and Doc Ock, a coin rolls towards the banker, he picks it up, but Aunt May slaps it out of his hand.
  • The bank moment is made even better by the fact that Aunt May and Peter remain perfectly calm and innocent-looking while the bank official is gasping in pain and glaring at them.
  • After Doc Ock takes Aunt May hostage, she sees him bringing a blade out of his claws to impale Spider-Man. Her indignant "Shame on you!" sounds more like a mother scolding her child for swearing than a civilian talking to a supervillain. Then she saves Spidey by smacking Doc Ock with her umbrella.
  • After Spider-Man saves Aunt May from plummeting to her doom, she admits she's been wrong about him. Then Spidey tells her that they definitely showed Doc Ock. Aunt May asks what he means by "we", all but accusing him of trying to steal some of the credit. Poor Peter isn't quite sure how to react.
  • After Spider-Man saves Aunt May from Octavius, leaves her on the street and swings away, several girls quickly crowd around her, screaming to Spider-Man, "Take me with you!"
• The planetarium party, while an overall depressing scene, has its moments of levity.
  • Peter tries to get some food from a tray, but someone takes the last piece right as he is reaching for it. All he can do is just look at the caterer, who walks away without even glancing at Peter.
  • Peter then notices two high-society guests walk by and offers to take their pictures. They agree and pose for him, but he realises he hasn’t taken the cap off his camera’s flash. As he tries to take it off, someone calls the guests and they walk away as Peter is readying his camera. Peter has a Flat "What" look on his face as the guests disappear, without him knowing.
  • Jameson orders Peter around to take pictures of his wife with high-profile guests.
    Jameson: Here, get a shot of my wife with the Minister here!
    Mrs. Jameson: [poses with the Minister] Beautiful tie!
    Jameson: Oh, now get a shot of us with the DA!
    Mrs. Jameson: [both pose with the DA] Beautiful dress!
    Jameson: Oh here, get a shot of the Mayor and his girlfriend… [the mayor and his wife glare] wife.
    • In the last photo, Jameson has a nervous grin, his wife has an "Oh, no" expression, and the mayor is apologetically smiling at his unamused wife.
  • After he finds out that MJ is dating John Jameson, Peter looks dejected and tries to eat some sweets. Again, someone grabs the last piece right before he can reach it. This time Peter glares at the person offscreen.
  • Peter tries to talk to MJ but she makes it clear that she is tired of waiting for him. He tries to use Dr. Octavius' advice of feeding her poetry. It doesn't end well.
    Mary Jane: I don’t know you and I can’t keep thinking about you. It’s too painful.
    Peter: I've been reading poetry lately.
    Mary Jane: Whatever that means.
    Peter: Day by day he gazed upon her, Day by day he sighed with passion, Day by day…
    Mary Jane: Don’t start.
    • This gets a nice Call-Back in the novelization when Octavius barges in on Peter and Mary Jane in the cafe.
      Doc Ock: Peter Parker. And the girlfriend. Took my advice, did you? Let me guess: The poetry did the trick, right?
      Mary Jane: [to Peter] You told me you’d been reading poetry—because he suggested it?
      Peter: He wasn't nuts at the time. [to Otto] No offense, Doctor.
      Doc Ock: The truth hurts, but I endure.
  • Realising that ultimately MJ has moved on from him, Peter grabs a glass of cocktail from a nearby tray. Turns out it was an empty glass. Poor Peter.
• Who could forget:
  Robbie: Still no word on the whereabouts of your son's fiancée. Sorry, Jonah.
  Jameson: [sighs] It's all my fault. I drove Spider-Man away.
  Ted Hoffman: He was the only one who could have stopped Octavius.
  Jameson: [sighs] Yes... Spider-Man... was a hero. I just... couldn't see it.
  [THWIP]
  Jameson: [turns around] He was a...[sees the Spider-Man suit is missing] A THIEF! A CRIMINAL! He stole my suit! He's a menace to the entire city! I want that wall-crawling arachnid PROSECUTED! I want him STRUNG UP BY HIS WEB! [looks up at the skylight] I WANT SPIDER-MAAANNN!!!!
  [Spinning newspaper headline: "HE'S BACK!"]
  • The outtakes give JK Simmons trying to say "... a thief!", and struggling due to the false teeth in his mouth that won't stop popping out. In the finished film there's a camera cut as Jameson starts enunciating "thief", so it's probable he never managed to pronounce it without his teeth falling off and they had to cut the scene around it.
  • In the outtake immediately following the false teeth mishaps, JK Simmons tries to say the "I WANT SPIDER-MAN!" line but shakes his hand so much he crumples up the piece of paper he was holding and chooses to toss it away mid-sentence and say "I WANT... A NEW PROP!" instead.
  • Just to make it even better, Peter cheekily leaves a message signed "your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man" in the time it takes Jameson to notice that he's been there and taken his suit back.
  • When even Hoffman, dimwitted ass-kisser he is, points out that Spider-Man is the only one who could have stopped Doc Ock, Jameson has to agree with an exasperated "yes".
• "Dear, we agreed to put on a wedding, not go into bankruptcy. [beat] Caviar?! What, are we inviting the Czar?! Get some cheese and crackers... some of those little cocktail weenies."
  • Jameson's first response when Betty brings in the garbageman with the costume:
    Jameson: Don't tell me you have the head of an extraterrestrial in there, because if you do, you're the third guy this week.
  • J. Jonah Jameson is willing to pay Peter $300 for Spider-Man photos...but only $50 for the actual costume, to which the garbageman protests, "I could get more than that on eBay!" So Jonah raises his buying price to $100 and asks Betty to throw in a bar of soap.
  • Gets a Brick Joke in the finale: when Jameson realizes Mary Jane stood up his son at the altar, the very first thing he says to his wife, with the utmost seriousness in his voice, is:
    Jameson: Call Deborah.
    Joan: The caterer?
    Jameson: Tell her not to open the caviar. [cue Joan slowly turning her head to stare at her husband in disbelief]
  • Jameson gets back on the phone with his wife after Betty tells him she's on hold:
    Jameson: Flowers? How much?
    Joan: [on the phone] $500.
    Jameson: You spend any more on this thing, you can pick the daisies off my grave! Get plastic! Gotta go, big story! [hangs up the phone and cackles triumphantly]
  • "SPIDER-MAN NO MORE" gets a big front page picture while a story about Ock gets pushed to the back pages.
    • The novelization adds some extra hilarity to this when Doc Ock reads the story and is actually annoyed that it's overshadowing his own coverage.
  • The extended cut adds the scene illustrating this page where JJJ dons the suit and does some mock web shooting, while the rest of the Bugle crew look in exasperation from between the blinders.
• During the bank fight, Doc Ock's tentacles have pinched around Spider-Man's head, giving him the opportunity to growl:
  Doc Ock: You're getting on my nerves.
  Spider-Man: I have a knack for that.
  Doc Ock: Not anymore.
• This phenomenally dickish taunt from Doc Ock when he drops Aunt May off a building:
  Doc Ock: Butterfingers!
  • In the extended cut, as Spidey and Ock fall, brawling, they crash through the window of a law firm, duke it out for a few moments while a terrified paralegal backs into a corner, then resume fighting outside as the terrified woman scampers.
• In the iconic Traintop Battle, Doc Ock increases the speed of the train, breaks the brake lever, tosses it to Spider-Man, who does a Double Take. Ock then gets off the train, (as in jumps out of the speeding train to a nearby building).
  Doc Ock: You have a train to catch! [salutes Spider-Man]
• An unmasked Spider-Man is trying to stop the speeding train, but his first attempt fails. The passengers inside are all freaking out, but the train driver isn't amused.
  Driver: [deadpan] Any more bright ideas?
  Spider-Man: I've got a few, yeah!
  [Cut to Spider-Man with a "What do I do now" look on his face]
• After the train passengers do the whole "go through me" thing for Spider-Man, Doc Ock simply shrugs, goes "Very well," and executes his Foe-Tossing Charge.
• The Video Game has one of Spider-Man's all-time funniest lines, when he is confronted by the Shocker:
  Spider-Man: Shocker, you look good! Have you been re-upholstered? ^note Despite his name, Shocker's powers are vibrational, not electrical (that would be Electro), and he wears a soft, padded costume that looks a little like a quilt to protect himself from the effects of his own weapon.
  • One of the exchanges that can occur as you're slinging your way around NYC; what really sells it it Tobey Maguire's delivery:
    Sassy Black Woman: You tha man, Spidey!
    Spider-Man: [confused] You tha... woman?
  • Bruce Campbell tells you that if you find all the hint tips, they'll say "something different". Then, when you've found them all, they do indeed say "Something different."
  • Your last confrontation with Mysterio. You've faced him in a burning theater where the floor was literally lava, fought his UFOs attacking the Statue of Liberty, and gone through a twisted funhouse. The last time you face him... He's robbing a convenience store.
    • He strikes a dramatic pose, three health bars fill... then you smack him and he goes down in one punch.
    • The sheer idea of alien invaders robbing a store. Spidey even lampshades it, saying, "Aliens holding up a convenience store? This I have to see."
  • Mysterio in general, especially Spider-Man's refusal to take him seriously:
    Mysterio: Now, prepare to meet you end in my... FUNHOUSE OF DOOM!
    Spider-Man: "Funhouse of Doom"? I thought you were an alien.
    Mysterio: Silence!
• On a meta level, serious fans of the Justice League cartoon series will likely look at the train scene and go "Do something, Green Lantern, you're standing right there!"
• Some behind the scenes moments:
  • Sam Raimi brought a guest to help out Alfred Molina to understand exactly what kind of performance he wants. The guest is seen enacting the scene of Doc Ock performing his fusion experiment with the arms attached to him. Who is the guest? Why, the Big Bad of the previous movie, Willem Dafoe of course! He even uses his Green Goblin voice for this scene. Molina has a good laugh over this and the two actors then shake hands.
  • A close up shot of Alfred Molina is shown as he growls menacingly. As the camera pulls away, he breaks character and starts singing, "If I Were A Rich Man" from Fiddler on the Roof (he was rehearsing for a Broadway production at the time). The puppeteers make the arms dance along with it. It has to be seen to be believed!

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