Being directed by the guy who made the Evil Dead movies (which aren't exactly crowning achievements of subtle horror), a lot of the Spider-Man Trilogy's charm comes from Sam Raimi intentionally invoking the silly '60s style of the comics and the animated show, as well as ensuring that Spider-Man remains a Kid-Appeal Character mascot.
These are the instances that didn't work. Or did. It depends on what you watch these movies for.
Spider-Man
- Green Goblin's death in the first film: impaled on his own weapon, the look of agony, the groaning... But look at where the glider hit him.
- As the glider hurtles at Goblin, there's a sudden inserted close-up of Goblin casually saying "Oh." before it impales him. It's a weird beat that seems completely out of step with the rhythm of the scene, especially considering that all of the scene's music cuts out for that shot.
- The scene where angry citizens start throwing stuff at the Green Goblin is already overstated and cheesy, but the one dreadlocked guy's extremely bizarre line reading of "I got something for yo' ASS!" makes it even funnier, sounding as though he was tossing the Goblin a tube of Preparation H.
- "It's you who's out, Gobby! Out of your mind!" A line so unbelievably cheesy, Kirsten Dunst couldn't help but laugh at it in the DVD Commentary.
- From his initial fight scene, the Green Goblin randomly shouts "IMPRESSIVE!" when catching a punch from Spider-Man before kicking him into a table. Between the abrupt pacing, the hammy delivery, and the fact that Willem Dafoe's mouth stays visibly still the entire time, it's both jarring and hilarious.
- The Green Goblin's murder of the Oscorp board. On paper, Norman straight up vaporizing them sounds terrifying. But the way they're near instantly turned into suspiciously clean looking skeletons which immediately dissolve into dust feels like it's straight out of a cartoon.
- The Goblin disguising himself as an old lady is already a pretty silly concept, but it's even funnier when a stock female scream plays as he reveals himself to Spidey.
- Spidey being tossed into an abandoned building, smashing through a window and being pumpkin bombed to the face in rapid succession is brutal to watch...but when it comes to the pumpkin bomb, it becomes darkly hilarious because of the slow-mo explosion shot giving you a perfect look at Peter's wide-eyed, flabbergasted, almost stoned looking face as his mask blows in half.
- Spidey cornering and beating down Dennis Carradine is mostly tense and emotional, except the immensely out of place cartoon "boing" sound effect when the latter gets knocked into a heap of scrap.
Spider-Man 2
- Many serious, empowering moments are made difficult to take seriously by Tobey Maguire's strange facial expressions, which bounce all over the spectrum from Dull Surprise to Chewing the Scenery. The infamous train scene from the second film is particularly tough to sit through because Peter's face scrunches up to an immense degree; it looks like he's preparing for a werewolf transformation scene.
- In the aftermath of Octavius's experiment going wrong, Harry ruminates on how he's ruined. His petty tone of voice is bad enough in the midst of a catastrophe that left people dead or severely injured, but when one of his workers comments that Spider-Man saved him, his response is hilariously awkward.Harry: All I have is Spider-Man. [...] He humiliated me by touching me.
- Meanwhile Rosie is Stuffed in the Fridge with the dramatic visual of glass flying right for her face through a reflection on her eye, with the impact being instantly fatal to drop her on the spot. Right after Harry's moment above, her corpse is pulled away on a gurney — with a perfectly intact face being the only shown part of her body, after her death scene specifically hid it as the only injured point.
- The scene where Doc Ock's tentacles come to life and kill the surgeons is terrifying, but there's one moment that just looks plain ridiculous; one of the surgeons is dragged screaming into the shadows while desperately digging her nails into what, from the look and sound of it, is a metal floor — and somehow leaves scratch marks!
- Toward the end, when Peter sees a big-ass wall about to collapse on MJ from behind, he lets out a wail that is not only over the top to the point where his voice cracks twice, but comes with a close-up of his face as he makes it. Though it's somewhat understandable since it's a wall about to fall right on top of the love of his life, but... just listen.
It sounds like some awful, unholy high-pitched roaring noise that escaped from the fires of hell and out of Tobey Maguire's mouth.- What is almost as funny is the face he makes JUST before this moment. He looks as if he is about to shit his pants as he watches MJ about to be squished.
- It takes a lot of steam out of the scene when the winds from Doc Ock's experiment make the whole scene awkward as MJ falls over and they accidentally incite a Panty Shot. And the actress focuses more on correcting her skirt than being terrified of the wall about to crush her, complete with her screams suddenly going much more muted and awkward. It's as if they pulled off a Marilyn Maneuver at the worst possible time.
- The extra who can't stop screaming, going in all directions doing so until she's directly facing the camera.
- "I have nothing left except Spider-Man" is an incredibly dramatic line, so it's hard not to chuckle at the clash between what's written and Harry's weirdly underwhelming delivery of it.
Spider-Man 3
- The scene where Mary Jane breaks up with Peter. Tobey Maguire's had many crying scenes, but this is where he truly hits his high of Inelegant Blubbering.
- The two little kid extrasnote suddenly commenting on the large climactic fight scene:
- The incident that causes Harry's Laser-Guided Amnesia comes off as a bit more slapstick than dramatic. Pete catches Harry off-guard with a web clothesline, knocking him off his hoverboard, flipping him into a ventilation pipe...and hitting at least two more things on the way down to the pavement. The epic music cutting out right as this happens certainly doesn't help.
- The trailer alone had MJ saying "Everybody needs help sometimes, even Spider-Man." twice. As if we didn't know the symbiote would mess him up, she just really wants to drive home the point that Pete really needs help.
- The many "Emo Peter" moments themselves technically don't count, as they actually are going for laughs. However, the sheer Mood Whiplash they cause with the dramatic portions of the movie do count, as these scenes are just so ridiculous, it can be hard to take what follows seriously. The most jarring example would be Peter straight up hitting Mary Jane, after he just performed a batshit insane dance routine.
- He walks into a clothing store, and the door opens up instantly after it closes without even a transition cut, as if Peter just pulled video game logic to quick order and change his outfit in a second. While the comics and the cartoons showed the symbiote had the ability to mimic other clothes, it is never shown in this universe, making it more confusing.
- The second fight between Peter and Harry later in the movie, which is inexplicably set to jazz music. Intentional motif for Emo Peter, sure, but it makes the scene feel less like an intense clash between two former best friends turned bitter enemies, and more like something out of West Side Story (1961).
- After Peter mockingly asks if "Goblin Jr." is gonna cry, Harry growls and tries to stand up…before getting awkwardly chopped by Peter, sending him right back down. Peter's wide-eyed shock for a split second before doing so just adds to the hilarity.
- Harry's Vehicle Vanish due to coming completely out of nowhere, and doing so in a public area where nobody seems to care. The very real possibility of him just hiding under the table also gets a laugh (it helps that a guy in the background seems to actually react to Harry disappearing).
- Eddie praying for God to kill Peter. It would be one thing if his religious side and hatred for Peter was played up, but the fact that he just does this because Parker cost him his job and made an offhand comment about religion can get a laugh just because it's such an unbelievable overreaction, particularly because the photoshop that Peter exposed was so obvious than anyone was likely to do so sooner or later.
- The overtly dramatic way that Peter inexplicably changes his hair to the famous emo style.
- The supposedly brilliant Gwen's upset reaction when she realizes Peter's whole grand dance routine with her was for Mary Jane. This is despite them showing up to a place where MJ works, Peter going right up to her, plays the piano onstage with her, clearly looking at her, and saying "this one's for you".
