Amazing Spider-Man: Reveiw

So when I heard about the Spider-man reboot I'll admit I was a bit sour. Although I wasn't thrilled with how the third movie panned out, I didn't blame Sam Rami or the cast for it. Leading up to the movie I had already heard the stories of how the studio pushed to have Venom shoehorned into a already completed script. So when I heard Sam and friends left the series, and the studio planned a reboot with the villain the the original director was planning to use, I was just little skeptical about it.

Then came the news that they had selected the director for the film, 500 Days of Summer's Mark Webb. While thoroughly enjoyed 500 Days, I wasn't sure how this director would tackle a tent-pole action movie. Well on July 3 my questions were answered. While The Amazing Spider-man isn't a bad movie it isn't a great one. For a Spider-man movie I personally felt it was lacking on many fronts. The cast led by Andrew Garfield (Peter Parker /Spider-man) and Emma Stone (Gwen Stacy) turn in decent performances, but nothing holding as much emotional weight as the original series, the exception to the rule being Dennis Leary's Captain Stacy.

The much touted and talked about origin story of our heroes parents is but a blip in this 136 min movie which gives us the abridged addition of the origin story in favor of courting sequences between the leads. While this plays well to the director Mark Webb's strong suits, it eats up screen time in chewy dialogue sequences that fill the gap between the lacking action. While the original series action sequences were long ballets of epic danger, Amazing gives us short couplets of manageable daring. that isn't to say that the action is bad but it feels a bit lacking in comparison.

Which brings us to the tale of two Spider-men. In the original series, much like the comics, Tobey Mcguire's Peter Parker is a young introverted and shy science geek who's parent's have been lost to him in a terrible accident. Orphaned he is raised by his Uncle and Aunt who's meager earnings barley keep things afloat in the household. Andrew Garfield's Peter Parker is a quiet loner who is awkward in social situations. After a break in his parents rush him to his Uncle and Aunt's house to leave him in their care whilst they leave in the night only to die in a supposed accident.

Tobey's Peter avoids confrontation and is dragged into social situations begrudgingly by his best friend and confidant Harry Osborn. Andrew's Spider-man isn't afraid of confrontation calling out bully Flash Thompson (in Amazing a two dimensional meat head with a jarring character change later in the film.) and using his powers later to humiliate and intimate him.

While most fans will initially rejoice over the use of Gwen Stacy and the addition of  mechanical web shooters vs. the organic web shooters in the original, the love story is essentially the same, but carries out its story with nagging plot holes. For instance how does a multi-national company that makes everything from polymers to tanks have a high school student working as a intern? Where did Peter Parker get the money to buy (offline no less) a industrial grade adhesive, and machining tools from Oscorp and no one put together that the guy buying the web fluid is Spider-man?

I could go on and on about what I didn’t like, I feel it’s fair to give the movie it’s due. It manages the retelling of the story and focuses on the budding love story between Gwen and Peter. This portion of the movie is handled with great care as it is the meat of this film. It provides a fair amount of action and the fight sequences aren’t as frenetic as the ones in the last series allowing for viewers to more easily follow what is happening. The characters though not very complex in their portrayal, are easy to remember and you understand their roles in Spider-man’s life clearly. Also although I felt the performances in Amazing were a bit flat (again with the exceptions of Denis Leary and Rhys Ifans who did a good turn as The Lizard.) they were still good performances. I just feel they weren't as good as the original trilogy of movies.  

All in all this film presents us with a new incarnation of Spidey for better or worse. This is a Spider-man for the twilight generation. He reflects what is seen as there values and is representative of their lives. As I come to understand it he is their everyman. I say this with no malice toward twilight fans, but you should ask more of your films or maybe my standards of what a Spider-man film should be are skewed. Either way it is up to you to decide what you like and don’t like. If you are a fan of the comic this one may disappoint you. If you are a fan of the films you may enjoy this one. If you’re a girl being dragged to see this and don’ mind your superheroes dreamy eyed and non threatening and handsome, well why are you still reading this! Go buy your ticket!

So until next time Mighty Marvel Maniacs and Spin Sepenteers , stay in good spirits and good health!

Carl Blackman

and if you haven't watched the trailer yet watch it below!