The (Not So) Amazing Spider-Man Review

This summer, Sony rebooted their ‘Spider-Man’ film franchise in order to keep the film rights with a brand new cast, brand new director and brand new style, ala Christopher Nolan’s ‘Batman’ trilogy. And now, ‘The Amazing Spider-Man’ is headed home with the Blu-Ray and DVD release next week on Monday 26^th November.

In 2007, the ‘Spider-Man’ film franchise ended with ‘Spider-Man 3’ and being squashed underneath a rolled up newspaper. Expectations were high for the third instalment with teaser posters showcasing the Black Suit Spider-Man and looked to be a darker tone as Spider-Man faced his greatest enemy, Venom.

But instead we got a whining and crying Tobey Maguire as Peter Parker, who later became an emo who danced down the street in a montage that is scared into my retinas. Oh and Vemon, he appeared in the last 20 minutes of the 2 and half hour film and was killed as fast as he appeared on screen.

So you can expect many a fan, including me, were happy when news came that the series would not be getting a 4^th directed by Sam Raimi, but instead getting a reboot directed by Marc Webb. Spider-Man…Webb…Coincidence? I think so.

Was this new take on Spidey better? Yes and no. 

With more advanced CGI comes more advanced scenes such as many of Spidey's web-slinging sequence with iconic poses stripped straight from the comics and for his fight sequences against this films baddie The Lizard/Curt Conners, played by Rhys Ifans when he wasn't CGI'd up to the be a reptile Gollum.

There was also a better cast giving greater performances than those given in Raimi’s trilogy. Emma Stone stood out as Gwen Stacy, the first love of Peter Parker's life who works well acting against Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker/Spider-Man. 

I'll cling to the fact that Tobey Mcquire played a great Peter Parker, but wasn't such a great Spider-Man. Whereas Andrew plays a great and cocky, quip giving Spidey but fails to hit the nail on the head as Peter, a bit unsure of what kind of Peter he wants to portray, from nerdy high school kid to emo, rebel skateboarder. Martin Sheen plays a great Uncle Ben and Sally Field plays a funny and charming Aunt May for their brief moments and Denis Leary is Captain Stacy, Gwen’s father and Police Chief of New York for some great action packed, comedic and heart-breaking scenes. 

But ‘Amazing’ was not a good ‘Spider-Man’ film because it was too soon for the retelling of a story many of us can tell off buy heart. Trailers advertised that we would learn the “Untold Story” of Spider-Man, but it was more of a story that we already knew but in the Christopher Nolan approach, by giving the origin story of the character a darker tone. 

Whilst Spider-Man was portrayed at his best, Peter Parker was a mess and mixture of different aspects of the character, from an orphan abandoned by his parents and forced to live with his aunt and uncle who feels they don't understand him, helping people empathize with the character to the hipster geek who likes photography, tinkering with machines and an skateboarder. Though he was a photographer and invented his web-shooter devices, he never was a skateboarder and served no purpose to the story except to show Peter as being bit of a rebel and that his prowess and skills on the board transferred to his skills as being Spider-Man.

‘The Amazing Spider-Man’ was a film trying too hard to be different than its previous incarnations, but wound up being the same and telling the same exact story. This video highlights some of the flaws I have mentioned, and many more.

Overall, if you are a fan of the man that does whatever a spider can, you’ll love this. But an "Amazing" film, it was not. 

I'm a nerd, and this was my rant.