This review contains spoilers for both The Amazing Spiderman 2 (2014) and Spiderman 2 (2004).
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Spiderman. He's one of the most iconic and well know superheroes ever created. The character has appeared in comics, TV shows (both live action and animated), video games, and now, he's just appeared in his 5th feature film.
The Amazing Spiderman 2 is the 5th Spiderman feature film to debut in the last 12 years. It's also the second second Spiderman film we've seen since Sam Raimi's Spiderman 2 10 years ago, which can be kind of confusing to talk about at times. Especially since neither era of Spiderman movies have ever had subtitles after the sequels names, opting instead for just a number, further adding to the confusion.
However, aside from the name similarities Spiderman 2 and The Amazing Spiderman 2 couldn't be more different. There are of course the obvious differences, instead of Toby Maguire as the webslinging wonder we have Andrew Garfield, instead of Kirsten Dundst's Marry Jane as a love interest we have Emma Stone's Gwen Stacey. The Amazing Spiderman 2's special effects have the benefit of not being a decade old, and therefore, inarguably better, but they don't have Alfred Molina's Doctor Octopus, instead the have Jamie Foxx's Electro. Harry Osborne appears in both films, played by James Franco in the 2004 film, and Dane Dehaan this year.
But for a fan like myself, I can't just talk about The Amazing Spiderman 2 no, because for me and I'm thinking a lot of fans as well, my opinion of this latest second Spidey movie has to be framed by my opinion of the old second movie.
SO that's what I'm going to do. Sam Raimi's Spiderman 2 vs Marc Webb's The Amazing Spiderman 2
Sam Rami's Spiderman 2
Now personally I've never been a massive fan of the Raimi films I liked the first one, hated the third and just couldn't get into the second one, which I know is not the most popular of opinions to have. Many fans I know adore Spiderman 2 and call it the Raimi Trilogy's high point. But I find Spiderman 2 to be, at times, a tough sit.
There are good points of course, Raimi really nails a lot of the comedy in the film, whenever he makes a joke it really lands well and his action scenes are extremely well constructed. Particularly the fight that takes place up the side of the building and the train sequence. Alfred Molina's Doc Ock is a great character and shines every time his story's given time to do so. J.K Simmons' J. Jonah Jameson has always been my favourite part of the Rami films, over the top and hilarious, I just always want more of him yelling for MORE PICTURES OF SPIDERMAN. Rosemary Harris's Aunt may is warm and wonderful and also brings a lot of light to the movie.
But for me the weak points in Spiderman 2 is the drama and the casting of the lead characters. Toby Maguire's Peter Parker comes off extremely whiney, dough eyed and strangely apathetic. He appears to have no real drive to do anything of value. He tends to kind of just not say a lot and take whatever path offers him the least resistance.
The best example of this is during the second act of the film. Peter Parker gives up being Spiderman (something that actually happens in both films) this causes New York's crime rate to soar, and allows Doc Ock to just saunter around the city committing whatever crimes he wants. Peter shakes his great responsibility entirely, why? Because he's too stressed out from missing a few of Mary Jane's plays and various other events. Raimi's Spiderman gives up because being a superhero was just too inconvenient. Not really a quality I want to see in my hero.
That aside the "romance" between Peter and Kristen Dundst's Mary Jane takes up a lot of screen time in the this movie and there's not a strong chemistry between them. I don't really ever feel while watching that movie, that I want Peter and Mary Jane to work it all out, all I want is for both of them to move on, because they don't seem that right for each other or not, I have a hard time caring what happens to these two blank faced disjointed characters have to say at all.
They never have a good time together, they don't have any inside jokes or funny memories together, they don't seem that attracted to each other, they're just kind of in love with each other? Sort of? Maybe at times? Because it's in the script?
I don't know I just don't feel it, the main characters just don't show a lot of attractive qualities, instead they're melodramatic, melancholy and seem out of place in what should be a light hearted superhero adventure flick. Which then makes the brilliant comedic elements seem out of place and leaves the audience sitting through boring, melodramatic dialogue between characters they don't really care that much about, waiting for the action to begin.
James Franco is cast as Harry Osborne and somehow is both over and under utilized to move the plot along. He's a pretty non-threatening quasi-villainous Harry Osborne who's opportunity for an interesting and engaging story is instead used purely for sequel bait. Franco does perhaps the best job of the three "best friends" with what he's given, but he ind of just pops in and our of the movie seemingly only to serve to explain a very specific plot point. Harry is the reason most of the plot of the movie even happens and yet somehow he has almost no character moments with either of our two main characters outside of when he shows up drunk that one time.
On the whole, I feel like Raimi's Spiderman 2 is a film that has not aged well. To me it's a film with some fantastic action scenes that don't last long enough, with long stints of.....something... in between them. I think a lot of that rests on Maguire who doesn't really seem like he's over coming anything, instead being dragged from plot point to plot point and starring at people for way too long before leaving weird creepy sounding messages for people. He's not the loveable, lame witted, nerdy kid with a heart of gold spiderman should be. Instead he's just a guy who's constantly apologizing, starring and mumbling.
It all feels like a recycled and rehashed version of the first film, only replacing Peter's transformation into Spiderman with him... giving it up so he can just do it again. All the same tropes and plot points are present from the main villain being schizophrenic and killing himself in the end, to Marry Jane being with another guy for most of the movie only to end up kissing Peter in the end.
To me Spiderman 2 is not at all the masterpiece that a lot of the comic book community sees it to be, and it never really has been. I don't get why people seem to adore this movie so much. Is it just because it came out when many of us were kids? Is it because MJ finds out who he is? I don't know, I've never understood it's popularity.
The entire time watching it I'm constantly wanting to see a hero who has an actual personality. A hero who does everything he can do to help those in need. A hero that's actually just as entertaining to watch inside the suit as he is outside of it.
That's where we come to this.
Marc Webb's Amazing Spiderman 2
When Sony announced that they were rebooting Spiderman. I like I'm sure many of you said "Really? we just finished a trilogy like 4 years ago!" As such I went into the first Amazing Spiderman movie highly skeptical and doubting I'd enjoy it. What I got instead was not a perfect movie but one that went in a completely new direction with the way all of the characters in the Spiderman universe were portrayed. I finally saw a Spiderman movie with people in it that acted like real people. Andrew Garfield's Spiderman does so much right that Toby Maguire's never did. Garfield's Peter Parker is awkward, but not in the stereotypical nerd kind of way, he's smart and quick but just doesn't know when to stop talking which often lands him into trouble. He and Emma Stone had great chemistry and while the villain seemed a little on the generic side, the efforts made to tie The Lizard into Peter's past is a good way to make him more interesting.
On the whole I really liked the first movie, much more than I thought I would and was expecting great things in the second film.
Amazing Spiderman 2 could have been a mess though. It's a story with two main villains, both of which have to have their origins explained. There was also the issue of Gwen and Peter's relationship which were it to continue defied a promise made in the end of the first film (The first film implies that they keep dating but leaves room for explanation otherwise). There was also the baggage of Peter's parents' story, which was left unfinished. It's a lot more baggage than Rami's film had going in, Spiderman wraps up everything in a nice neat little bow with only marginal character cliffhangers. Amazing Spiderman leaves much more untold. So while I was hoping for the best, I was preparing myself for a cluttered, over-saturated spiderman movie (we have seen them before). What I got instead was a tight story that tells a lot, but still feels intimate and exciting.
The highlight to both Webb web movies is by far the interpersonal character drama, the exact opposite of the Raimi films. The chemistry Webb sets up in his first film between Gwen and Peter only seems stronger in this movie as their many scenes together become almost more entertaining than the action. Stone and Garfield play two unique sides of a young couple, madly in love dealing with the very real and intense guilt Peter feels for betraying Gwen's father's last request to stay away from each other. That plot point alone puts this romance head and shoulders above the awkward and cliche "will they, won't they" of the Rami films. Every minute Gwen and Peter are on screen together you can see, evidently, how these characters feel about each other and how exactly their relationship is in danger, but more than just that, you want it to work, because these two kids are meant for each other. But the brilliance in this relationship is that you also don't want them to be together, because you feel Peter's guilt for breaking his promise to Captain Stacey. It makes the audience wish that they could find a way to make it work, which is exactly what the characters are trying to do which is again why it works so well. Their relationship really holds up the rest of the film, giving Peter motivation for doing the things he does, whether he's fighting actively to find a way to make it work, or trying to throw himself into investigating his father to try and forget about it. It's not just believable, but intensely relatable. Something we all really should expect from the director of 500 Days of Summer.
Gwen is clearly someone immensely important to Peter in this film, and the weight of their relationship drives them both to make the choices they do, including the choices that lead to her death in the end of the film. Which is heartbreaking for both the audience and Peter. This is what causes him to give up being spiderman. The death of Gwen, not just being late for things. It's understandably devastating to Peter, and makes his end decision to continue web slinging a gloriously triumphant moment. More so than it would have been any other way.
Peter continues to be a three dimensional character in Amazing Spiderman 2 showing huge swaths of humanity and compassion that Toby Maguire could never quite muster. In this film Peter continues to be very funny, ready with a response to anything. But Garfield's webhead is, in this film, not always right. He fails and makes mistakes, bad calls and often times doesn't know how to handle the situation, but always tries his utmost to do the right thing. This is shown very well in his relationship to Dane Dehaan's Harry Osborne.
In this film, Harry is an old friend of Peter's from when they were small children, a friend Peter had at around the time of his own parents disappearance, but not for long after. This is why Peter seeks him out upon learning that Harry's father has passed away. Even though they haven't spoken in years, Peter returns to Harry like a friend paying back another friend's kindness. It's this familiar distance that makes the plot between them work nicely. Harry is a weird kid in this film, scheming and petulant, Harry is never painted as that good of a person, even at his best, which would make Peter and Harry's relationship strange if they had been best friends for years (this is what happened in the Raimi films). Peter instead, only really knew Harry as a kid and is trying to re-connect with him, which is why he doesn't notice anything off about Harry, instead assuming he's just upset over his father's passing and perhaps a different person to the one he knew years ago. Harry is also not, as was in the Raimi film, looking for revenge following the apparent murder of his father by Spiderman, which, from his point of view is pretty understandable if you think about it. Instead Harry comes to hate Spiderman for his own selfish reasons, the same reasons that lead to his mutation into the green goblin.
The other nice thing is that Peter isn't fooled by Harry for too long, instead figuring out his intentions early. Then, upon seeing how destructive they could potentially be decides not to aide him as either Spiderman or Peter. In short, Webb's Peter Parker isn't a dough eyed idiot who refuses to see Harry Osborne for what he really is. Amazing Spiderman 2 has a much, much better dynamic and a better one in my opinion between these characters which makes both their shaky friendship and then animosity both more believable and real.
But that's not all the praise I have to give out for the character work in this movie, oh no.
The periferal characters all shine as well, from Jamie Foxx's obsessive and mentally unstable Electro to Sally Field's courageous and vulnerable Aunt May (who, thankfully, still hasn't been kidnapped). There's also great cameos by Paul Giamotti, Dennis Leary and of course Stan. Every character in this movie is a real person, with understandable challenges and struggles. The great victory of Amazing Spiderman 2 is that the audience can almost see themselves as any of the characters.
The plot is well paced, throws a lot at you, but gives each storyline it's due attention without feeling like it's frantically rushing from story to story (see Spiderman 3). The movie opens with an explanation into Peter's parents' backstory, which is resolved towards the end of the second act of the movie. Electro and The Green Goblin's origins are given enough time to tell their stories without stepping over each other, which I think is a huge win. This film has Electro's origin largely take place early on, until the he's imprisoned after a fight with spidey, and then broken out by Harry Osborne in the third act who's had the intervening time to have his own villainous origin (even though he gets his "powers" very, late in the film). This neatly sidesteps the pitfalls a lot of these multi-villain stories fall into by not having the stories overlap, but instead logically intersect at the end. Which is extremely well done, action packed, fun, poetic and also heartbreaking, like any good spidey story should be.
There are occasionally moments in the story that do feel forced. Gwen's story revolves around her decision to go to school in england or stay home with Peter, which isn't exactly groundbreaking. Also Peter seems to spend a lot of time in his room, which gets tiresome and I missed J. Jonah Jameson. But apart from those small gripes I absolutely adored this movie.
Amazing Spiderman 2, for me, delivers in every area that Spiderman 2 didn't and matches or exeeds it at it's good points. Amazing's overwhelming heart and serendipity are what make it a better movie. Webb is so much more at home dealing with real character drama than Raimi seems to be. Raimi's character moments always feel contrived and lack the same enthusiasm and style his action scenes have, whereas Webb keeps the audience equally engaged in both. It's not an easy task that Webb accomplished beautifully. Webb's film takes a look at the heart of the hero and is a movie about the weight of promises. Raimi's is about responsibility and looks at what it means to live a double life. I don't think Raimi's film is a "bad" movie, it's watchable, and has some genuinely good moments, I just find the Webb's more moving, engaging, and entertaining. And isn't that what movies are all about, being moved, enthralled and entertained?
In short, go see Marc Webb's webslinger in action in The Amazing Spiderman 2 it won't be something you regret.
