Created in 1962 as part of the big wave of superheroes that began in 1961 with Fantastic Four, Spider-Man proved to be one of Marvel Comics’s most successful characters. A teenaged nerd who was made fun of by the jocks, an orphan raised by his elderly aunt, and a young man with an overdeveloped sense of responsibility thanks to his indirect involvement in the death of his uncle, and also one of the funniest heroes around thanks to his predilection for witty banter, Spider-Man quickly became Marvel’s flagship character.
In the late 1960s, several Marvel characters were adapted into animation, with Spidey’s being by far the most popular (and getting an iconic theme song), and the character continued to show up on TV in either live-action or animated form through the 1970s (the Nicholas Hammond live-action show), 1980s (Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends), and 1990s (Spider-Man: The Animated Series).
But it wasn’t until 2002 that he got his own theatrical release, though it wasn’t for lack of trying for 25 years…
Initially, Roger Corman had the option to do a Spider-Man film, and I think we can all count our lucky stars that that option expired, given what Corman did to the Fantastic Four. It was then with Cannon Films from 1985 until the company went under in 1989, and Cannon’s Mennahem Golan kept the rights to Spidey with his new company 21st Century Film Corporation in lieu of a buyout when the desiccated remains of Cannon were sold to an Italian company.
The initial director attached by Cannon was Tobe Hooper, who misunderstood Spider-Man as being a teenager who was turned into a giant spider monster. Stan Lee then wrote his own treatment for a Spidey film that hewed a bit closer to the comics, and various scripts based on that treatment were written, each one with a smaller and smaller budget in mind as Cannon collapsed under its own weight. (One particularly brutal budget slash occurred after the abject failure of Superman IV: The Quest for Peace.) Lee’s movie treatment would later be adapted by Peter David into a novella that appeared in the 1994 anthology The Ultimate Spider-Man, published by Berkley Books (which also included your humble rewatcher’s first-ever work of published fiction, the story “An Evening in the Bronx with Venom,” co-written with John Gregory Betancourt).
CarolCo started developing a film written and directed by James Cameron, and that led to years of legal wrangling between CarolCo and 21st Century, as Golan and Cameron seemed to have competing version of a Spider-Man film happening. Or, rather, not happening.
Eventually, Columbia Pictures wound up with the rights as part of a weird rights-swapping thing with MGM (CarolCo’s parent company) involving the James Bond films. Columbia acquired everything Spidey that had been done up until then. David Koepp was hired to write a new script, which was based on Cameron’s detailed treatment. Rewrites were done by Alvin Sargent and Scott Rosenberg, but ultimately Koepp was given sole credit with the blessing of Sargent, Rosenberg, and Cameron.
Brought in to direct was Sam Raimi, who grew up reading Spider-Man comics and was a huge fan of the source material, which at the time made him pretty much unique among directors of a comic-book property. Luckily, this would change in subsequent years…
“You’re not Superman, you know…”
Spider-Man
Written by David Koepp
Directed by Sam Raimi
Produced by Laura Ziskin and Ian Bryce
Original release date: April 29, 2002
We first meet Peter Parker as he’s running for the school bus that will take him to Midtown High. The driver takes a sadistic glee in not stopping, said glee shared by everyone on the bus except for Mary Jane Watson. MJ is Peter’s next-door neighbor, and he’s had an unrequited crush on her since he was six. However, she’s dating the class jock, Flash Thompson.
Peter’s only real friend is Harry Osborn, the son of Norman Osborn, the very wealthy head of Oscorp. But Harry doesn’t take the school bus, he gets chauffeured to school. Harry has washed out of every private school Osborn has sent him to, and Midtown High is his last chance.
The kids take a field trip to Columbia University, where they get to see their genetic engineering lab. There’s a gigunda electron microscope, and also fifteen genetically engineered “super-spiders.” Both Harry and Peter see MJ getting annoyed with Flash, but Peter is too nervous to approach her. Harry instead uses some facts about the lab that Peter told him to impress her, to Peter’s annoyance.
However, Peter is taking photos for the school paper (Flash and his friend keep bumping him while he tries to take pictures), and he uses the need for a picture of a student with the science stuff as an excuse to talk to MJ and take pictures of her.
One of the “super-spiders” has gotten out of its cage and it bites Peter on the hand.
Oscorp has a contract with the military, and their latest project is a performance enhancing formula that combines with an exoskeleton and a jet-glider. Unfortunately, there are concerns about the side effects of the formula. The general in charge of the contract—who inherited it from his predecessor—gives Osborn a week to perfect it or he’s pulling funding and giving the contract to Quest, Oscorp’s greatest competitor.
Peter returns home to his aunt May and uncle Ben, begs off dinner, and collapses in bed, feeling very poorly. However, he wakes up the next morning to discover that he’s got greater muscle tone, he no longer needs his eyeglasses, and he’s generally stronger and more energetic. At school that day, he rescues MJ from slipping on a wet floor, and discovers that he can shoot webbing from his wrists. He accidentally webs a tray of food into one of the kids.
Flash picks a fight with Peter, and Peter actually wins it, to everyone’s shock. Peter runs away from the school, a little frightened. He realizes he can stick to surfaces and is able to climb walls. He figures out how to control his web-shooting ability, and very soon is swinging around Queens like Tarzan.
He finally gets home, having totally forgotten his promise to Ben to help paint the kitchen. He does, at least, take out the trash, and hears the latest loud argument next door in the Watson house. MJ goes outside to get away from the shouting and she and Peter have a nice talk that is interrupted by Flash arriving in his cool new car. Peter decides that he needs a car to impress her, and finds two ads in the paper: one for a car that costs just under $3000, and one for a wrestling competition against “Bone Saw” McGraw—stay in the ring with him for three minutes, and you win $3000, the more colorful the opponent, the better.
Peter says he’s going to the research library on 42nd and Fifth, and Ben offers to drive him so they can talk. Ben is worried about him, missing chores and getting into fights, but Peter blows him off, even reminding him that he’s not really Peter’s father. Ben cautions him that with great power comes great responsibility, which will probably be important later.
Peter then goes to the arena where the wrestling is being held. Bone Saw makes short work of his opponents. Peter, wearing a red sweatshirt emblazoned with a spider, a red ski mask, red gloves, blue pants, and red boots, and calling himself “the Human Spider,” enters the $3000 competition. The MC thinks “the Human Spider” sucks as a name and instead introduces him as “Spider-Man.”
After Peter commits the world’s biggest upset by disposing of Bone Saw in two minutes, he’s then only paid $100, because the deal is to stay in the ring with him for three minutes. As Peter walks away, dejected, someone robs the box office. He escapes by running past Peter, who holds the elevator door for him. Peter takes great pleasure in screwing the guy who screwed him.
He changes clothes and heads back to the library, only to find that Ben has been carjacked and shot. He dies in Peter’s arms, and then Peter goes after the perp. The cops and Peter both chase him to an abandoned dock, where Peter is horrified to discover that the person who murdered his uncle is the same person who stole the wrestling box office receipts. The person he could have stopped, but chose not to, and Ben paid the price.
Back at Oscorp, Norman Osborn decides to test the formula on himself. It gives him enhanced strength, but he also gets the side effect of insanity to go with it. In a mad rage, he kills Dr. Mendel Stromm, one of his head scientists, and also makes off with the jet-glider prototype and the exoskeleton. However, when Harry finds him later on the floor of his study, he has no memory of it.
In honor of Ben, Peter puts together a better costume, er, somehow and starts saving people’s lives and generally stopping crimes as Spider-Man. He also graduates high school, earning a science award. Osborn is pleased to see that Harry actually graduated, and rents an apartment downtown for both Harry and Peter to share, as Osborn views Peter as a good influence on his son. MJ, meanwhile, breaks up with Flash and gets a job as a waitress at a diner while auditioning for roles, pursuing her dream of acting. She also starts dating Harry, something Harry neglects to tell Peter.
Daily Bugle publisher J. Jonah Jameson thinks Spider-Man is a vigilante menace, but he also sells papers, so he continues to put him on the front page. He’s also frustrated at the lack of good pictures, and puts out word that he’ll pay top dollar for good pictures of him. Peter sees this, and makes sure to set up a camera with a timer when he stops an armored truck robbery. He sells those pictures to the Bugle.
Using the jet-glider and exoskeleton, the latter modified to look like a green goblin, Osborn kills the general and several officers of Quest, as well as their exoskeleton prototype. Thinking it will eliminate the competition, Osborn is horrified to realize that his actions have prompted Quest to make an offer to buy Oscorp, replacing the lost resources from the attack with Oscorp’s—their condition being that Osborn himself be removed from the company. The board of directors has unanimously accepted this offer.
Livid, Osborn puts on the armor, boards the jet-glider, and attacks the World Unity Fair in Times Square that Oscorp is sponsoring. He kills the entire board of directors, and almost kills several more people, including MJ, but Peter is there taking pictures for the Bugle, and changes into Spider-Man to save the day. (Though one girl is saved by an older man who looks just like Stan Lee.)
On Thanksgiving week, the Goblin attacks the Bugle, wanting to know who it is taking the pictures of Spider-Man. Jameson doesn’t give Peter up, insisting even as he’s being strangled that they’re sent anonymously by mail. Spidey himself shows up—Peter was in the building already dropping off more photos—and Goblin gasses him, bringing him to a rooftop and offering him a partnership. Spider-Man refuses and manages to get away, though one of Goblin’s weapons cuts his arm.
Harry and Peter host Thanksgiving dinner at their apartment, cooked by May, and with Osborn and MJ attending as well. Peter is late, of course, and Osborn realizes that Peter is Spider-Man when he sees the cut on his arm that’s in the exact same place the Goblin cut Spider-Man. Osborn leaves in a huff, pausing to decry MJ as a fortune-seeker who only cares about Harry’s trust fund and not him. Harry’s complete failure to defend MJ leads to her leaving in a minute-and-a-huff.
Peter meets MJ after an audition, and then he saves her from being mugged as Spider-Man. MJ insists on kissing Spidey.
Osborn figures the way to get at Spider-Man is through his loved ones, so he damages May’s house and injures her badly to frighten her.
While visiting her in the hospital, MJ declares that she has a crush on Spider-Man, and Peter admits that he “knows” Spidey (claiming to be his unofficial photographer), and tells MJ what he thinks of her, by way of what he told Spider-Man about her. They wind up holding hands, which is, of course, when Harry walks in. Harry leaves in a couple of huffs and goes home and tells Osborn that MJ is in love with Peter, and Peter has loved MJ since he was a tiny tot, and Osborn pumps his fist and says, “YES!” as he now has a way in to Spider-Man.
He kidnaps MJ and takes her to the Queensboro Bridge, making sure Peter knows he took her. He sabotages the Roosevelt Island tram and drops both the tram and MJ toward the water and tells Spidey he can only save one. He manages to save both, aided by the people on the bridge who show solidarity with Spider-Man by throwing detritus at the Goblin, and two guys on a barge on the East River, who maneuver under the tram and catch it and MJ both.
Once the people are saved, Spidey and Goblin’s fight takes them to the abandoned mental hospital on Roosevelt Island where the fight gets brutal. Goblin reveals himself to be Osborn and he pleads with Peter to help him, as he can’t control what the Goblin does. But Peter can’t get past all the people he’s killed and he continues to fight. Goblin tries to impale Spidey on his jet-glider’s blade attachment, but Spidey dodges it at the last minute and it guts Osborn instead.
Osborn’s last words are “Don’t tell Harry,” so Peter removes the Goblin armor and leaves Osborn’s body at his home. Harry walks in on Spidey as he’s putting the body down. Later at the funeral, Harry blames Spider-Man for his father’s death. Peter realizes that Spider-Man will always have enemies, so when MJ declares her love for Peter, he says that he can only be her friend. But they do kiss, and MJ touches her lips afterward, as if that kiss is vaguely familiar…
“I missed the part where that’s my problem”
There are very few things I’m grateful to The Matrix for, but one was that, watching it in 2000, I realized that technology had finally reached the point where Spider-Man could be done convincingly in live action.
And this movie proved me right two years later, as—unlike Nicholas Hammond’s stunt double—the actions of Spidey in this, aided by what was then state-of-the-art CGI, looked like what Spider-Man is supposed to look like. The web-slinger’s acrobatics are very unique, and also pretty much impossible for a real human being to manage. (In the comics he always looks like someone has folded his spine in half.)
Watching it again sixteen years later, the CGI isn’t always quite as seamless as it seemed then, but it still works, mostly because Spidey is so fast-moving and almost ethereal in his acrobatics that the weightlessness of turn-of-the-millennium CGI works in its favor.
The casting in this movie was pretty much perfect across the board. Tobey Maguire is quite good, perfectly channeling Steve Ditko’s Peter Parker. (Andrew Garfield would later channel John Romita Sr.’s version.) He’s utterly convincing as Peter the nerd, as Peter when he’s newly empowered and cocky as hell, and as Peter when he’s guilt-ridden. The one thing he’s not so good at is playing Spider-Man, as his time in costume is mostly spent having fights and things. There’s precious little of Spidey’s trademark banter and wit, which is a big part of what makes him so appealing. (This was one of the reasons why I cheered loudly in the theatre when Tom Holland showed up in Captain America: Civil War, because while both Maguire and Garfield did a fine job playing Peter, neither of them quite captured Spider-Man.)
The supporting cast is also very strong, with Cliff Robertson and Rosemary Harris bringing a quotidian dignity to Ben and May, Kirsten Dunst being radiant and lovely and also more than a little pathetic (but deliberately so) as MJ, James Franco perfectly inhabiting Harry as an entitled asshole, and Joe Manganiello is the quintessential Flash Thompson. Plus we get several of Sam Raimi’s regulars in cameos, from Bruce Campbell’s wrestling MC to Lucy Lawless as a punk chick doing a person-in-the-street interview to Sam’s brother Ted as a beleaguered Bugle editor.
The two standout performances are by J.K. Simmons and Willem Dafoe. The latter is despite the best efforts of the script, as there’s a lot of clunky dialogue here, and Osborn gets some of the worst of it. Having said that, he elevates the material, making Osborn’s Gollum-and-Smeagol act as his Goblin persona convinces Osborn to do evil things much more convincing than it deserves to be.
As for Simmons, he gives the performance of a lifetime here. J. Jonah Jameson is one of those characters that shouldn’t work, but does. When done right, he can be a brilliant, complex character, and when he’s done wrong, he can still be entertaining comic relief. Simmons’s version of Jameson manages both. While much of the dialogue in this film is dire to say the least, Jameson’s is all perfectly on-point, and Simmons’s rapid-fire delivery makes it all sing. And even as we see what a bottom-line-loving, cheapskate, judgmental ass he can be, we also see that he has journalistic integrity, as even under threat of death, he won’t give up one of his people to a super-villain.
The thing that impressed me the most watching this movie, both then and now, was how perfectly Raimi adapted the source material. He understands what makes Spidey tick, but he also understands what makes big summer blockbusters tick. The best adaptations are ones that are true to the spirit of the source material, but also work in the format they’re being adapted to, and Spider-Man is a master class in this generally, particularly in how it handles Spidey’s origin.
In Amazing Fantasy #15, Spidey is even more arrogant than he is in this movie after the wrestling match. The robber runs past and Peter just stands there, and when he’s castigated for not trying to stop the guy, Peter shrugs and says he’s only looking out for number one now. Then when he goes home, he finds out that his uncle’s been killed during a break-in and he tracks down the killer, only to find that it’s the same guy.
Raimi keeps the basics, but he tweaks the details in such a way that it works magnificently. The wrestling promoter basically cheats Peter out of $2900 thanks to a loophole, and when Peter complains, the promoter smiles at him and says, “I missed the part where that’s my problem.” When the thief steals the box office receipts and the promoter yells at Peter for letting him go, Peter retorts, “I missed the part where that’s my problem.”
I saw Spider-Man the first time in 2002 in a packed theatre in Times Square in New York. About half the audience cheered when Peter threw the promoter’s line back in his face, because that’s what we’ve been trained to do. That moment, where the hero gives a jerk his comeuppance by repeating his own dialogue, is always a crowning moment of awesome for the hero in an action movie.
The other half of the audience—who’d actually read Amazing Fantasy #15—were just shaking our heads and wincing. Because we knew what was coming.
When Peter corners the carjacker who killed Ben, we see that it’s the same guy, and it’s devastating—more so because Raimi’s brilliantly used the tropes of action movies to make the point hit even harder than it did in the original comic.
More fundamentally than that, though, is that Raimi gets what makes Spidey tick: Peter’s attempts to balance his personal life with his responsibilities as Spider-Man, his messed-up love life, his overdeveloped sense of guilt and responsibility. I also like how the movie shows the transition from high school to adulthood, as Peter, MJ, and Harry all struggle with what to do with their lives after graduation.
Last week, I neglected to talk much about Ang Lee’s “comic-bookish” directing style, and I don’t want to make that mistake again, so let’s talk about this week’s elephant in the room, the organic web shooters. I don’t like them, but I don’t blame the filmmakers for using them. That was a leftover from James Cameron’s treatment that was kept in because the web-shooters are kind of problematic. The comics are basically stuck with them as is, but it’s really hard to look at them as an invention of Peter’s and reconcile that ability to invent something so awesome with his perpetual money problems. The number of practical applications of the webbing are numerous, even with the fact that it dissolves in an hour (which is Marvel’s spackling over of why Peter was never able to market it, because it disintegrates). I generally prefer the MCU version, with Tony Stark providing the webbing, but even that has its problems, as it takes away from Peter’s own scientific brilliance, which is an important part of the character. (The Garfield films just went with what the comics did and had him create it, which was honestly just fine.)
Spider-Man was a huge hit, and deservedly so, as it was the perfect storm of technology allowing the hero to finally be shown in all his glory combined with a director who understood the character working from a script that got his essence down nicely. A sequel was green lit in short order, and released in 2004. We’ll take a look at Spider-Man 2 next week.
Keith R.A. DeCandido is Author Guest of Honor at ConGlomeration 2018 in Louisville, Kentucky this weekend, alongside Gaming GoH James L. Sutter, Artist GoH Stephen Hickman, and a whole bunch of authors, artists, editors, cosplayers, and more. His schedule can be found here.
This movie is remarkably faithful, and obviously it was very successful, but even at the time I found it a bit too slow and morose. Maguire is good as sad-sack Peter, as you say, but without the lightness of Spider-man to balance out his character he is a bit too dreary to root for. The Green Goblin is sort of a problem in a live-action conversion too: it’s hard to make a mask that both conceals Osborn’s identity, but is also expressive enough to make him compelling as a villain.
I’m not sure if these movies did right by Dunst and Mary Jane, either. In some ways I appreciate how her character is fleshed out, including her sadness and her yearning. Sometimes comics Mary Jane seems so effortlessly successful in her personal life that the only thing she has to do as a character is worry about Peter–not so here, she has her own life and problems. But I just didn’t get much chemistry between Dunst and Maguire. The result is that their romance feels obligatory; she’s going to end up with Peter because well he’s a nice guy and they’re supposed to, not because this is actually going to be a fulfilling relationship.
Simmons is great though, like you say.
To decompose: The “biocabling” was developed by Oscorp as part of the spider program headed by Peter’s late father, and during the period when Peter was interning for Doctor Connors, a supply of webbing ampoules was sent to him. It’s the wrist-worn webshooters that Peter hacked together in his bedroom. Later in the movie, he applies that ingenuity to his camera to capture a confrontation with The Lizard in the storm sewers.
I saw Spider-Man the first time in 2002 in a packed theatre in Times Square in New York
In his “Really That Good” video on the first two Spider-Man movies, Bob Chipman touches on an element (almost an elephant…) that I kind of expected you to mention as well, Keith:
2002. In New York.
The “You mess with Spider-Man, you mess with New York!” sequence had a weight right then that it…well, it always would have, it’s an awesome scene, but right then…with Spider-Man already having had to make changes regarding the Twin Towers (the infamous teaser trailer), the idea that New York City would collectively say “don’t screw with us”…
I was in the suburbs, but I have to imagine the cheers at that were even more deafening than the “not my problem” reversal.
scifantasy: Yeah, some changes were made to the film after the events of early September 2001. One was to digitally erase the Twin Towers from any skyline shots they had already done. One was to have one of the person-in-the-street interviews be of construction workers at Ground Zero. And then there was the Queensboro Bridge scene.
I loved that bit at the time, and I still like it, but it felt weird watching it now, like the movie was trying a little too hard. But then, we all were then…..
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
But then, we all were then……
This.
I loved this movie. I loved it when it came out, and I love it now. Spider-Man was the first superhero I encountered, as a child (thanks, Electric Company), the first comic I had a subscription to, at the age of six (thanks, Grandma), and while my tastes have shifted and changed over time, I always appreciate a well-told Spidey story.
This movie, more than any other superhero movie to that time, except possibly Superman, GOT it, even moreso than X-Men did. I said in a previous comments section that the best superhero movies embody the core of the character, and for Spider-Man, that’s always going to be “power and responsibility.” The freedom that comes with being Spider-Man is part of the power, and as you say, this was the first time that CGI was up to showing us that. The responsibility is on the writer’s shoulders, and they pulled that off perfectly too. If that means Peter was a little less quippy than he would be in comics, so be it. I can overlook the organic web-shooters in exchange for the fight with Flash in the hallway.
Colin: Dunst’s version of MJ owes a great deal to the Watson family backstory that Tom DeFalco and Ron Frenz provided in Amazing Spider-Man in the late 1980s when they revealed that MJ knew that Peter was Spider-Man all along. MJ’s freewheeling devil-may-care personality was revealed there to be a defense mechanism against a lot of pain, and the screenwriters and Raimi obviously wanted to focus a bit more on the pain part. Which is fine, as it worked in this particular movie.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
I mostly agree with this review. I mostly loved the film and the things it got right. Seeing Spidey’s acrobatics captured in a way that only the ’90s animated series had achieved before was wonderful. Rosemary Harris was the best Aunt May ever. And I loved the pure Raimi embellishment to the Green Goblin’s death scene — that wide-eyed “Oh!” moment when it dawns on him that it had been a bad idea to send a lethally sharp-pointed death glider flying directly towards him. It’s exactly how it happened in the comics, but that one little “Oh!” elevates it to a new level.
There are things I think could’ve been better, though. I never really bought Tobey Maguire as Peter or Spidey. The movie changed the character to fit the actor, it seemed to me. The loss of Spidey’s banter and wisecracks was the main problem, but Peter has his own humor and attitude that are, to me, very different from Maguire’s gentle-nerd persona. He did a good job playing that version of the character, but it wasn’t the version I know and like best. Similarly, Dunst’s MJ was a pretty great departure from the comics’ bombshell party girl concealing hidden depths of pain and kindness. (Plus her hair color changed in every movie, just like Famke Janssen’s did as Jean Grey. The one time they got a natural redhead in these movies, they cast her as Gwen Stacy and dyed her hair blonde.) It didn’t help that only a few years earlier, I’d had a college friend who basically was MJ, a warm, lively strawberry-blonde theater major who looked like a John Romita character brought to life and who started a brief Broadway career in 2003. So I couldn’t help imagining what she could’ve done with the part.
It also bugged me that they started with MJ as Peter’s love interest instead of Gwen, which meant they couldn’t bring the bridge-abduction sequence to the conclusion that was so powerful in the comics (though kind of fridgey in retrospect — we’ll talk about that more when we get to ASM2). Although I loved the part with the ordinary New Yorkers coming to Spidey’s aid, because I always love it when civilians are inspired by superheroes to be heroic themselves.
As for Simmons’s J. Jonah, he did uncannily look like Ditko’s JJJ, but I’ve always felt they played him a bit too much for screwball comedy. “My” JJJ will always be Ed Asner’s version from the ’90s animated series, and I like the depth and gravitas he brought along with the comedy.
And yes, I hated the organic webshooters. They avoid the problem of how Peter could invent the things in his bedroom, but they bring too many equal or greater problems. Spiders’ spinnerets aren’t on their forelimbs, and they don’t squirt webbing out under pressure; those things only make sense for mechanical webshooters. Plus there’s the question of how much Peter can produce without becoming dehydrated and deprived of nutrients. And you lose the versatility of the things that can be done with mechanical webshooters, and most of all you lose the fact that Peter’s inventive genius is one of his greatest superpowers.
“(The Garfield films just went with what the comics did and had him create it, which was honestly just fine.)”
Actually they had him steal the synthetic-web tech from Oscorp and retrofit it into webshooters, so it’s only halfway his own invention.
I had thought that Homecoming showed Peter mixing web fluid on the sly during chemistry class. Did Tony make the mechanical shooters and Peter make the fluid itself?
I got all the way to the last paragraph of the review before I even remembered the great organic web-shooter debate. I agree that Peter’s genius is his greatest power, and I would’ve liked to see it displayed. I’m pretty sure I would’ve happily overlooked the inconsistency of how he invented them in his bedroom, because that’s the way it’s always been. The number of comics fans willing to die on that particular hill didn’t speak well of comics fandom, I think.
I’ll grant you that they didn’t need to write them into the comics, especially the way they did, but changing the comics to match the movie was the style at the time, and the trend is worthy of analysis itself.
Do we know that in MCU Stark actually INVENTED the web-shooters?
As with Brian MacDonald above, I have very fond memories of Spider-Man’s appearances on the Electric Company, and I’m sure he was included somewhere in the big box of childhood comics (mostly coverless, mostly from overreading) that I had before I started “seriously” collecting; but I never started buying him regularly until the MacFarlane series (heaven help me).
I do like this movie, and its sequel, quite a bit, although at this point I think the MCU version is the better interpretation.
I just re-watched the scene from Civil War with Tony in Peter’s bedroom. Peter’s got the webbing and the shooters already, so he invented them. Stark specifically mentions he’s impressed by the webbing design, and is surprised that Peter invented it himself.
This movie is still in my top ten movie theater experiences of all time. I remember being totally and completely amazed by the visuals.
@10/Brian: The comics’ abortive attempt to incorporate the organic webshooters is one of the most annoying things about them. They were introduced in a really bad storyline where Peter was cocooned and metamorphosed by an evil insect-queen villainess and emerged with organic webshooters and the ability to communicate with insects (even though spiders are arachnids dammit), and then they used those in like one or two subsequent issues and otherwise just ignored them and kept it ambiguous what kind of webshooters he was using. And then, less than two years later (probably mere weeks in story time), they did The Other: Evolve or Die, in which Peter went through another cocooning/metamorphosis from which he emerged with an enhanced spider-sense and with venomous spikes that shot out of his wrists when he was angry (because that’s totally something spiders have yeah right), and the previous metamorphosis storyline wasn’t even mentioned, as if the creators just wanted to quietly retcon the whole thing away. And then, not long after that, they did the whole awful One More Day partial reboot that wiped Peter and MJ’s marriage from continuity and also reset his powers to normal without explanation, mechanical webshooters and all.
Right, Stark took the terrible costume and the homemade web shooters and turned them into something fancy because he has resources.
That was my main issue with Spidey all along: how did he make that costume and create those web shooters when he’s a lower-middle-class teenager living in an old house in Queens with two retirees? The MCU addressed this by having Peter create shitty versions of them and Stark designing new fancy ones based on his designs.
And yes, I misremembered the first Garfield movie that he invented the shooters, but the web formula was Oscorp’s. Whatever.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
@14/ChristopherLBennet: I was perfectly willing to elide the whole terrible “The Other” storyline, but thanks for rehashing it for everybody else in the comments who didn’t get to enjoy it when it happened.
@15/krad: See, that’s one thing I like about the Nicholas Hammond version. The costume looks like something that a college kid with a decent amount of sewing skill could whip up on his own. The eye lenses on at least one version of the costume even looked like they were repurposed from mirrored sunglasses.
And the Garfield movie had a montage showing Peter shopping online for specialty athletic bodysuits and such, so there’s at least some attempt to explain why his costume looks so fancy. And of course now we have Stark providing the suit. But the Raimi film just gives him this really overdesigned, expensive-looking suit with raised, textured webbing and such, without a word of explanation. It’s bizarre.
Hey, one thing that might’ve worked: Have Spidey’s show-biz career last longer than one night, and have his manager hire someone to whip up a fancier suit for his TV appearances. Although then you would’ve lost the powerful simplicity of the origin as depicted here. And the hero’s emotional journey is more important than explaining away a costume.
That moment in Superman II when Superman is apparently killed…and the people of Metropolis respond by taking on General Zod themselves.
That moment in Wonder Woman when everyone tells her that going over the top is too dangerous, and she does anyway…and they follow her.
Those moments give me goosebumps.
But that moment in Spider-Man when an anonymous New Yorker tells Green Goblin “You mess with Spider-Man, you mess with New York!” – and its parallel moment in Spider-Man 2, aboard the el – those moments make me teary eyed. Because unlike Clark Kent and Diana, Peter Parker really does need the help. And when he needs it, the people of New York are there for him.
We watched this in prep for your column :) I remember really loving this movie when it first came out. It mostly holds up, but there were a few times it seemed slow, or just…old fashioned. I think we’re a lot more used to quippy, snarky heroes now, and I agree that Tobey’s Spider-Man does seem a bit lifeless at times. I loved Tobey’s Spider-Man as a college kid – he was the kind of guy I had a soft spot. Kinda put upon, sensitive, kind of derpy, etc. Now I can’t help but feel it’s just a tad creepy and has a few vacant stare moments that are a bit unsettling. Like, in another movie he could easily be the serial killer or the Nice Guy that snaps.
I forgot how annoying all the teen drama was now that I’m not a teen/young adult. JUST TALK TO EACH OTHER, PEOPLE! The thing that bugs me about MJ leaving in a huff is that Harry DID try to defend her, although halfheartedly and was talked down pretty quick by his dad. But I guess as an adult it’s easier for me to see that Harry has his own baggage around his father and his father’s approval and so even that amount of defiance is a lot.
I had this huge girl crush on Kristen Dunst back in the day – I agree that she’s a little more ‘pathetic’ than I remember, but like you say, in an intentional way. She doesn’t quite get a lot to do, and you never quite know why Peter is so hung up on her, but she’s at least sweet/nice and trying to get out of a bad situation and living her own life outside of the frames of the movie.
Of all the characters, I find Harry the most interesting in some ways – the dynamic between him and his father I think has the most dramatic potential.
I always enjoyed Jameson, but I do love how – even as he’s in the middle of arguing with Peter about slander/libel and what his pictures are worth, that the very next second – while Peter is in the room with him – he flat out denies having any idea who takes the pictures as he’s getting his throat crushed. It’s his first instinct – the whole thing happens really fast.
I love when civilians get in on the action as well!
By the way – I follow a blog where every few days a new Weird Al song is discussed/analyzed. It’s fun. I wish the timing had worked out just a tad differently, because last Friday, the column focused on ‘Ode To a Superhero’. I did put a link to this column and at least somebody went and checked it out :) But here’s the cross-link!
https://www.nathanrabin.com/happy-place/2018/3/23/day-one-hundred-and-twenty-seven-ode-to-a-superhero-from-poodle-hat
@18/Mark Painter: One of the better parts of Superman Returns is when Superman falls from space, on the brink of death, and the Metropolis citizens and hospital staff work to try to save him. That’s another case where the hero really needs the help.
Although, I dunno, there’s something poignant about a powerless human being willing to rise to the defense of a superpowered hero. Intellectually, it’s a futile gesture, but it reflects an instinctive compassion and selflessness, and that’s what makes it potent. Like in John Byrne’s Man of Steel #6 where Jonathan Kent thought Clark was in danger and he rushed to his son’s defense with a shovel. It didn’t matter that he’d probably get himself killed going up against something that could hurt Superman; all he knew was that his son needed help, and he did what came instinctively.
These are JK Simmons movies as far as I’m concerned. The man is a national treasure.
The organic web shooters….that was probably one of the things that held me back from seeing this until I did. I first was exposed to it when I saw Tobey McGuire on Letterman and they were talking about one of the action figures–it was a Peter Parker figure but had the capability of shooting webbing. I didn’t understand why he’d be wearing web shooters as Parker. Then I learned they were organic, and I was at the age where that kind of departure from the comic bothered me for reasons illogical. The other thing that most likely held me back was how disappointed I was with first X-Men movie, and I didn’t want to think about what Hollywood would do to Spidey, especially knowing they’d already made that comics departure. I ended up seeing it with some friends in college during one of those college movie night things where they were showing it in the science auditorium. I loved it and I think was what kind of made me realize it was ok to start embracing a liking of comic book heroes again.
Tobey McGuire was never my favorite casting choice, even when he was the only modern blockbuster Peter Parker and not one of three–I just had a different vision in my head of what he was based on the comics I’d read and the 90s cartoon. But he does an adequate job for what these movies are.
This movie does show some signs of age: even during some of the times I’ve rewatched it prior to this week, I thought that some of the emotional talking scenes which were kind of poignant on a first viewing start to drag after a few rewatches, or maybe just in this day and age. A lot of the emotional/thematic beats seem to be really hitting the viewer over the head or kind of melodramatic or cheesy. And I just start to realize that there’s a LOT of talking in these films…in general this is the OPPOSITE problem I see with movies. A lot of the MCU movies, while enjoyable, I never really felt compelled to own because it just seemed like they were all too much action, and sometimes I wish they would just expand on some themes with more dialogue a bit. But I kind of feel the dialogue scenes in this film do kind of slow it down a bit. Oh–and the problem I’ve always had with these films was the insertion of kids that make it feel like they are the kids of someone on the production team. Here it’s the “It’s Spider-Man!” girl during the festival, and the dumb, totally vacant-looking kid who literally just stands there as a balloon almost falls on him–and then when he’s reunited with his mother, there’s a “Mommy!” voice over that really does not sound at all like it came from the kid we were just watching.
The other age-showing thing about this movie was some of the costumes…in particular, what all the kids are wearing during the science field trip. Their clothing looks really late 90s early 00s and I have a feeling that in another decade or so, it will really stand out. Also, when Norman is bringing Harry’s backpack to him, I noticed his suit was quite a bit larger/looser fitting than what the current style is. And then I noticed a continuity error where between the close up and medium shots where his tie jumps back and forth between perfectly straight and slightly off to the side showing a button, and I can’t unsee that now.
Regarding the bridge scene NOT fridging MJ…well, obviously when I see the Goblin dropping her off the bridge I think of Gwen’s death…but I think they just didn’t want the movie to be that dark. Even with the weightiness of Ben’s death, the tone of these movie was more that 90s-style uplifting, feel good type of movie. If anything, I think the Garfield ones where way too dark/downtrodden. I LOVED Homecoming though. So I think this was the movie that needed to come out at the time it did, and it absolutely worked.
Nitpicks aside, I think this is a pretty good film that mostly holds up. The only major thing that I think is kind of an odd story choice that threatens to take me out of the film is Goblin’s sudden, inexplicable desire to get Spider-Man to join him. He effectively gasses Spider-Man, and even when he DOES wake up, he’s paralyzed. Goblin could have easily killed or simply unmasked him then. He gives Spider-Man his offer, and even after having it rejected, gives Spider-Man time to think about it. Instead of leaving the hero for dead, he leaves the hero to live–and at this point, had already murdered a bunch of people in cold blood, including his former colleagues. The only explanation we are given for this is when he’s musing that Spider-Man is the only one who could stop him, he suddenly says, “Or imagine if he joined us!” But why? And why give him more time to think over the offer? And why not attempt to use the gas again during/after the bridge scene when he IS trying to kill him? Did he run out?
Oh, and I love Bone-Saw.
I saw this movie on opening day and – though I concede that the sequel is a better movie on an objective level – it is still my favorite Spider-Man film.
As Keith noted in his review, Raimi clearly understands that he is ADAPTING a story, rather than making wholesale changes. Therefore, it remains one of the most comic-booky of the 21st century superhero flicks. Moreover, it isn’t even modern comic-booky, but almost a cinematic love letter to the Lee/Ditko/Romita era. Nowhere is that more felt than in the dialogue – particularly in the scene in Times Square (“We meet again, Spider-Man …”) and in the mirror scene in which the two halves of Norman Osborne’s psyche are talking with each other out loud.
I too missed the more quippy Spidey of the comics, but I get how difficult that really is to adapt. Peter David wrote a book on writing comics a few years back and talked about how the dialogue in a spidey scene actually would take longer to say than the actual fight moves shown in the panels. I think that’s why “Here’s your change!” from the bank fight in the sequel was the closest we got to quippy Spidey in the Raimi films
Man, I really wanted to love this movie when it came out. Your review it perfectly captures how they did almost everything right. They stuck to the source material, the casting is mostly spot on, the CGI was good and the acting was (again) mostly brilliant.
However, I could not then and can’t now get over Toby McGuire are Spiderman. I watched the animated series in the 90’s and I loved it. And Toby is just not good enough, he is weird, greasy and somehow not very likeable. Whereas animated spidey was super likeable.
Such a shame, because as you say, JK Simmons and Willem Defoe were really good!
Oh, I forgot to mention — one other detail I like about this film is that it had Stan Lee saving someone’s life, getting to be heroic in his own right. And then they did it again in the sequel!
@23/crzydroid: I never understood why they called the wrestler Bone-Saw instead of Crusher Hogan.
@26/ChristopherLBennett: I always assumed they wanted to avoid any possible confusion with Crusher Creel, the Absorbing Man. But honestly, that makes almost no sense. Still, they could’ve called him “Bone-crusher,” and had the best of both worlds.
Between the omissions of the webshooters, the fight banter, and Gwen Stacy, I expected a bit more rancor in this thread. Perhaps the best testament to just how well Raimi put it all together is that, while people here are still nitpicking over various changes to whatever characterization or storyline from the comics they consider essential, they generally still concede that those changes were (maybe grudgingly) acceptable in the service of the movie as a whole. It’s a striking contrast with the “they changed X, now it sucks” attitude that afflicts so many film adaptations of comic books and novels.
If I’m going to complain about anyone missing, it would be Liz Allan or Betty Brant (who does appear, but only for one scene and isn’t named), as they’re actual characters in the early days of Spider-Man. Gwen and MJ were much later additions.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
I’ve always been more of a DC fan, but Spider-Man was the one Marvel character I most often read and followed…Like many of my generation, first knew him from the Electric Company (technically Spidey’s first live action screen depiction), and from 1987 on followed what news I could about this movie being made. Such high expectations for this film, and it really paid off…A very fresh feeling to the film, and most things got right (though not really haven read any comics in a few years at the time was confused by some of the updates I didn’t quite know)…I didn’t really mind the lack of quips, which I felt gave a proper level of humor…For whatever reason, I’ve always had a thing for Jameson, and am still astounded by how well they nailed JJJ both in looks and characterization…My only nits were with other characterizations, I agree with what others said abou how off MJ was compared to the comics, though she was nowhere near annoyingly self absorbed and whiny as she was in SM2, I found Emma Stone as Gwen a marked improvement…I also felt Flash Thompson, one of the more standout supporting Spider-Man characters got a short end of the stick. I felt he came off more of a one dimensional bully rather than the arrogant, but deep down not a bad person, jock he was usually portrayed as. In addition, there were no hints or clues to his ultimate redemption in becoming a trusted friend of Peter. Like MJ/Gwenn, this was improved on in the Webb movie…Only other nits were the climactic fight being reminiscent of that in the first Burton Batman film, and even similarities to the Empire Strikes Back/I am your father…As for the organic webshooter issue, recall reading somewhere they came up with that after the prop department couldn’t come up with webshooters meeting with anyone’s satisfaction…All in all, a good movie that managed to exceed personal expectations..
@24 I guess no one told them that talking is a free action.
Yes, the Spidey quips were mostly missing from the trilogy, which is weird considering Raimi’s gonzo filmmaker background and obsession with The Three Stooges. I recall Spidey making only one funny in this movie, when he’s taunting Bone-Saw, but he wasn’t quite full Spidey then. There may have been a few others.
Maybe since Simmons was such a dominate comedic force, they thought the quips would be overkill? I dunno. Anyhow, I was happy to hear the reboots adding more humor.
@29/krad: Worth mentioning that Elizabeth “Betty” Brant was played by Elizabeth Banks, who has since gone on to have a much higher profile. There’s also a bit part for Octavia Spencer, as a “Check-In Girl.”
I remember seeing it in a theatre where the audience talked back to the screen. “Kiss her, fool!” is still ringing in my ears.
I pretty much mostly agree with the review here. I think any changes are justified in needing to boil the ethos of 40 years of Spider-Man history down to one movie, in much the same way as the first X-Men movie did. I agree that JK Simmons as Jameson is one of the best things about it, managing to be a goofy comedy character and yet retain surprising depths. Yes, they’re going to use Mary Jane as the love interest because in those glorious days before One More Day screwed them over she was the love interest: It’s like using Pepper Potts as Iron Man’s love interest rather than that woman from Tales of Suspense #40, or having Wolverine in a love triangle with Cyclops and Jean Gray rather than Angel. To be honest, it bothered me more when ASM used Gwen Stacy and acted all “Aren’t we cool for using Spider-Man’s original love interest?” when in fact they’d grabbed someone who didn’t appear until 1965 when Peter was in college (after Mary Jane, technically!) instead of actual school-age love interest Liz Allan. I think Peter, Mary Jane and Harry are all fine, and I can only echo the praise for the New-Yorkers-helping-Spider-Man scene. The organic web-shooters I just shrugged off, it’s a way of doing it and not necessarily wrong to my thinking. I didn’t know enough about the mythology to know how much of the climax was copied wholesale from the comics and how much was tweaked to fit Hollywood sensibilities: In a movie, it works. I did however query the decision to give the Green Goblin a metal mask rather than a proper face mask.
The change to Spider-Man’s back story I think works in context. It received a bit of criticism from people who think nothing should be changed at all, but for me I was caught halfway between the two viewpoints of feeling the satisfaction of Peter getting one back on the guy who cheated him and knowing that he’s going to regret it later. Again, it’s ASM who commit the big scene as they copy the first act of this movie beat-for-beat and include the “Peter lets Uncle Ben’s killer go because the guy he’s robbing is an a***hole” moment, as though that’s the “proper” origin story rather than “Spider-Man doesn’t stop a robber because he thinks it’s beneath him” idea. Again, I’m drawn to what the recap misses out: The fact that the carjacker dies as a sort-of indirect result of Peter’s actions, something of a departure from the comics, where Spider-Man leaves him for the police and he dies years later as an even more indirect result of Peter’s actions.
@35/cap-mjb: It’s not simply about whether something is changed from the source. It should never be about that. Adaptation literally means change. If you don’t change anything, what’s the point in even trying to do a new version? The question is whether the specific changes work or not. Some changes are for the better, some are for the worse.
@Krad/29 I think you hit on something…One of the flaws seems to be with so many important SM supporting characters over the years it was hard to fit them all in properly. This is likely a reson for the dissatisfaction I noted regarding Flash Thompson’s portrayal in the film…
Another of those occasions where a faulty memory is possibly going to make me look like an idiot, but my memory is that the rift between Harry and MJ isn’t because he doesn’t defend her to Osborn or doesn’t do it enough, it’s because he then snaps at her and makes out it was her fault after Osborn’s gone, which has even Aunt May going “Dude, not cool.”
@36/CLB: Yes, and to my mind most if not all of the changes work, and whether they’re better or worse than the original is a matter of personal opinion. Using Mary Jane as the love interest from the start rather than going through a roll all of characters that Peter dated before her in the comic: Works. Organic web-shooters: Works, even if Doctor Science needs to take the day off to have a lie-down after trying to work out the mechanics. Having a happier ending to the Green Goblin dropping Spider-Man’s girlfriend off a bridge than in the source material: Works, because you don’t want to end Spider-Man’s first big screen outing with a huge failure, you need a decade’s worth of back story to make it work. (Switching Mary Jane in for Gwen doesn’t necessarily preclude the comics’ outcome. After all, the 90s cartoon did the same thing and had it end as badly as it could in a Saturday morning cartoon where no-one’s allowed to die on screen.)
There’s a lot to really enjoy in this movie, but I’ve always felt that its runaway success was more a function of how much people wanted to like it (more specifically, how much they needed a hero story at that particular point in American history. Witness that utterly gratuitous American-flag shot at the end. This is Spider-Man, not Superman or Captain America).
Most of the things I like and dislike about the film have already been pointed out. Some other observations and points of difference:
krad to the contrary, the CGI was pretty disappointing, even in 2002. The Goblin’s attack on Times Square simply looks terrible. (And Jesus, that Macy Gray cameo, which is even announced as such. It was already starting to date on opening day.)
Speaking of the Goblin, his Power Rangers outfit was also a poor decision. It doesn’t look any less silly than the actual costume from the comics would have.
It’s weird to suggest that Spidey’s appearance in Civil War was more in keeping with the character’s quippy nature than Raimi’s take. One could argue with that Holland’s first appearance is actually the biggest deviation from Spider-Man’s inherent sarcasm, and into full-on earnestness. That doesn’t bother me at all, because I think the depiction of him as verbose but innocent is a fresh and interesting take on the character. Sad to say, I still haven’t caught up with Homecoming, so I don’t know how that aspect of the portrayal has developed. Otherwise, Andrew Garfield in ASM has clearly been the closest to the character’s trademark smart-assedness.
While we’re on the subject, the Maguire line that strikes me as the most Spidey-like occurs when he gags Jameson with webbing, declaring that he and “Mom” (i.e., the Goblin) have to talk. Equally good is a moment no one here has mentioned: In that aforementioned Times Square attack sequence, Spidey’s first reaction to the endangered little boy is to mutter impatiently, “Come on, kid, MOVE.” That’s quintessential Spider-Man: ever slightly peeved at the situations in which he finds himself. (It’s also an attitude well understood by New Yorkers, whose experience is defined by having to share space with 7,999,999 other people who always happen to be standing exactly where you wish they weren’t.)
I really think the origin story loses something when Uncle Ben isn’t murdered in his home. It misses the point that tragedy will find you and your loved ones without your even having to leave the house, which strikes me as an important part of Peter’s epiphany. Although I guess Lee and Ditko strained credulity somewhat by having a guy who had committed a robbery in Manhattan get caught doing a break-in all the way out in Queens shortly thereafter.
I really wish they hadn’t had Peter graduate from high school so soon after becoming Spider-Man. So much wasted story potential. I’m glad the Holland movies seem to be taking the opposite tack. (Damn, now I really have to make time for Homecoming.)
And finally, I would have liked the “ordinary citizens resist the Goblin” bit a lot better without that ham-fisted, unnecessary dialogue about taking on one New Yorker meaning you take on all of them. It’s like, we understand the point of the scene, Sam. You don’t need to insult our intelligence by underlining it (especially when you’re letting one of your actors give a line reading that’s that poor). Then again, throughout these movies, Raimi shows that he never met a cornball moment he didn’t like. More on that next week.
@40/Stephen Schneider: “Although I guess Lee and Ditko strained credulity somewhat by having a guy who had committed a robbery in Manhattan get caught doing a break-in all the way out in Queens shortly thereafter.”
In the comics, it wasn’t “shortly thereafter,” but some weeks later, at least. After Spidey lets the burglar go, he comes home to find that Uncle Ben and Aunt May have bought him a new microscope. Feeling on top of the world, he thinks, “I’ll see to it that they’re always happy, but the rest of the world can go hang for all I care!” He then goes on “in the days that follow” to become “the sensation of the nation,” with headlines about him winning a showbiz award and being slated for a TV show. It’s when he’s returning home from a personal appearance that he finds the police car outside his home and gets the bad news.
What’s interesting about Spidey’s origin story, by the way, is that you can see that Lee and Ditko were working to the formula they’d honed in writing horror and sci-fi anthology comics in the years before the superhero genre resurged. It’s your standard Marvel short-story formula where the protagonist is driven by hubris and given his comeuppance by an ironic twist at the end. In isolation, leaving aside the final text captions promoting his further adventures, it doesn’t even really constitute a superhero story — just a story about a guy who gets a special gift, uses it selfishly, and pays a harsh price as a result. The fact that Lee and his collaborators used the conventions of their sci-fi and horror comics as the basis for the origins of their superhero characters is part of what made Marvel’s heroes so complex, because their powers were often curses and their origins were often shaped by their own arrogant mistakes.
@41/Chris:
Damn, you’re right! How could I have forgotten all that?
I guess the filmmakers’ need to truncate the origin part of the story dictated that Ben had to die sooner, which necessitated putting him near the scene of the original robbery.
And great observation about the O’Henry-esque nature of the original story.
Stephen: Interesting. I never thought of Ben being murdered in his home as a particularly inherent or important aspect of Spidey’s origin.
Having Ben’s death happen right away works better in a movie context — like I said, Raimi was using the conventions of action movies to make the story work, and it worked better happening right away in the movie, IMO.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
40.
No, but Spider-Man is a New Yorker, and has always been a New Yorker swinging through the skyscraper canyons for which New York is famous. It’s apart of his iconography. So it would’ve been strange for the movie to totally ignore 9/11 less than a year after the attacks. If not directly address the event, then the spirit of its aftermath seemed appropriate at the time.
@43/krad: Although now that I think about it, I can totally imagine Raimi doing a classic, corny spinning-newspapers montage showing Spidey’s rise to fame and glory before it all comes crashing down, in the vein of the top panel here.
@44/McFly:
But hauling out the American flag was not and is not a typically New York way of coping with 9/11. If anything, that kind of association was viewed with some suspicion by many New Yorkers, who were sensitive to the co-opting of their/our tragedy by people from other parts of the country who had up until that point been using NYC as a punching bag (and would soon enough go back to doing so — remember Ted Cruz sneering about “New York values” in 2016?).
Plus, the American flag is traditionally a symbol of the establishment and its institutions. Spidey is anti-institutional: the underdog who represents the little guy. He’s far too cynical and street-smart to wrap himself in the flag. There’s a reason he’s your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man and not your friendly national one.
@43/krad:
Yeah, I always thought that Ben being murdered in his own home had a particular emotional resonance. I still don’t think the story is quite as affecting without it. Although I’m much more perturbed by the many Batman retcons in which we find out that the Waynes were murdered because of some conspiracy that’s tied directly to their business dealings and/or family history. Nope, what makes that origin work is that their deaths were utterly random. It’s how Bruce learns empathy for all human beings, because he’s been made to realize that tragic loss can befall any one of us at any time, anywhere. Just like Peter realized that telling the world to “go hang” didn’t stop that world from intruding on his home with calamitous results.
#46
I don’t know, I remember an awful lot of patriotic fervor in New York during that time, like the rest of the country. Doesn’t fit the character so much, and maybe not the city, but fits the country circa 2002, and tentpole movies like this are made for people well beyond the city limits.
I just can’t blame the movie anymore than one made during WW2. Dated and eyerolling? Yes, but that’s what I like about movies. They’re time capsules.
@47/Stephen: “Nope, what makes that origin work is that their deaths were utterly random. It’s how Bruce learns empathy for all human beings, because he’s been made to realize that tragic loss can befall any one of us at any time, anywhere.”
Good point. One other factor that’s been lost in most adaptations is that it didn’t take place in some dark, spooky alley; “Crime Alley” was a nickname that the Park Row area acquired when it fell into decline after the Wayne murders. As originally shown, the murder took place on an ordinary sidewalk, right under a corner streetlight — and in the story that named Crime Alley, it was just a few doors away from a neighborhood theater. The fact that it happened right out in the open, in a public place that should’ve been safe, underlines how brazen and shocking it was, and it helps explain why a formerly ritzy neighborhood fell into decline thereafter. That gets lost in all the screen adaptations that take “Crime Alley” literally and have the murder take place in a dark alley that the Waynes would’ve had no reason to take their son into in the first place.
In the case of Uncle Ben’s murder, though, I don’t think it really matters where it takes place. The emotional resonance is in the fact that it happened because Peter didn’t care enough to stop the burglar the first time. In fact, there’s nothing in the original story that explicitly says the murder happened in the Parker home; the story is vague enough that the police could’ve just been there to notify May. Indeed, this was made explicit in J. Michael Straczynski’s run on The Amazing Spider-Man. When Aunt May found out that Peter was Spider-Man and he explained that he blamed himself for Uncle Ben’s death, May revealed that she’d always blamed herself for it, because she’d had an argument with Ben and he’d gone out for a walk, leading him to run into the burglar and get killed. So in that version, Ben wasn’t killed at home. I think that’s probably a retcon — I think there was an earlier storyline revealing that the burglar had broken into the Parker home in order to look for something May had hidden — but it shows that the original story was ambiguous on the location of Ben’s murder.
@49/Chris:
I hadn’t known of that Straczynski story, but your description of it reminds me of yet another Batman retcon I found unnecessary and ill-advised: The idea (submitted in some comic story of the ’80s, as I recall) that Bruce had argued with his father before his parents’ murder and was thus swimming with guilt. Come to think of it, to bring things back to the Spider-Man movie, I didn’t think it was all that wise to have shown Peter being rude to Ben as their last interaction, because that’s one origin story that sure wasn’t lacking in a guilt angle to begin with.
Overall, I’m just not a fan of origin retcons that pile on new details, because they often dilute the point of the original story, and seem to exist just so some “DC wage slave” (as Harlan Ellison put it, although the point obviously applies equally to Marvel) can feel as if he’s put his own stamp on the mythos.
But I suspect we’ll be talking about this a lot in two weeks, when krad rewatches Spider-Man 3. Ha!
@49/Chris:
So I just looked up the relevant panels from Amazing Fantasy 15, and the cop on the scene says, “It was a burglar — your uncle surprised him.” To me, the implication seems pretty strong that the burglar was either in the house or in the process of breaking in.
@51/Stephen: Yeah, the story implies that, but it doesn’t make it entirely explicit, which is why there was room for JMS’s retcon. (Well, arguably. I think that revision has generated some controversy in the past.)
Anyway, the point is, I don’t think the location really matters much in this case. The crucial thing is not where or how it happened, but why.
Like I noted earlier, I saw the movie on opening weekend. It was definitely a time where having Spidey swing before a fluttering flag was a surefire applause moment and I remember being one of the folks who rose to my feet at the end. I don’t know if I’m more cynical or if we live in a more cynical time, but I definitely miss being able to be that unapologetically patriotic.
@49/CLB: Yes, as I alluded to earlier it was established in Issue #200, during Marv Wolfman’s run on the comic, that the burglar broke into the house because it used to be owned by a 30s gangster who had stashed his loot there. After the burglar dies of a heart attack while being chased by Spider-Man (having gone after the loot again), Aunt May mentions that when they moved in they discovered the loot had already rotten away.
So I just realized that if the Goblin doesn’t know who is taking the photos, J.J. hasn’t been listing a photo credit.
@54/cap-mjb: I suppose the way to reconcile the Wolfman version with the JMS version is to assume that Ben was only just outside the house, about to start his walk, when he noticed the burglar breaking into the house and confronted him. In the panel art in the later version, Ben has only gotten as far as the adjoining driveway, so he could’ve noticed someone sneaking around back at that moment and gone to investigate.
@56/Chris:
Or we could deal with it the way I always have, which is simply to pretend that Spider-Man #200 never existed. God, what a lousy issue, especially after all the hype that led up to it. I think that’s when I stopped reading the book, and for decades.
The first movie as a great pay-off :
“And I know I’m not your father.
-Then stop pretending to be.”
And later :
“I have a father. His name was Ben Parker.”
The first time I remember ever seeing organic web-shooters was in Spider-Man 2099. I assumed that’s where the movie took its cue on that from.
It honestly never bothered me because of that. And I always found the plausibility of the web-shooters to be problematic. Not only that he would invent it, which is fine, but that he could somehow maintain a near infinite supply of them and the ingredients that went into it. That always bothered me, so the organic ones were better IMO.
@59/radynski: Actually, the struggle to afford the chemicals needed to make new batches of webfluid is part of the perennial “Parker Luck” and the recurring theme of Peter having to contend with real-world difficulties that get in the way of his superheroing. I think there’s been a time or two where he’s had to limit his use of webbing because he was too broke to make more. That’s one of the many advantages of mechanical webshooters as a plot device — the fact that they can easily become a disadvantage if they run out or break down.
If anything, the question of resources is even greater for organic webbing, because it’s his own body‘s resources that he’s expending. How much of his body mass is he expelling when he uses a large amount of webbing in travel or action? How much moisture and electrolytes is he losing?
Ok, I have loved comics since I was a young boy. One of my first jobs was working in a comic book shop. Spiderman is my all time favorite comic character. So with all that stated…I loved and STILL love this movie. I think it’s well-acted, well-directed, honors the source material, and overall is great in most facets.
Which is the only way it got me over the fact that I cannot stand Tobey Maguire. At all. Never have liked the actor. I think that’s why people (me included) tend to say that Spidey isn’t quippy enough in the movie, when it’s not that the jokes aren’t there, they are (as pointed out above), but Maguire’s delivery sucks. He can’t sell the Spidey humor. But that’s not really the writing’s fault. In fact, the writing actually makes you root for the character in SPITE of Maguire (for me, anyway.) I didn’t really care for Andrew Garfield either in the role, for other reasons, which we’ll get to when we get to ASM and ASM2. But everything else was pretty much aces.
And I will also state that if you like JJJ at all in the comics, Simmons’ performance is as close to letter perfect as you’re ever going to see. Ever. He’s wonderful and I wish they had brought him back for all the Spidey movies. I’m going to go home and watch this movie again. It is still one of my favorites, even if a few things haven’t aged wonderfully.
I wasn’t born back when the first Superman came out in 1978. So I wasn’t privy to the reaction it must have been to see a faithful adaptation of a comic book legend to the big screen.
I imagine that’s how it must have felt to a lot of fans when Spider-Man came out in 2002. I was a casual reader at best. And even to me, the final result was mind-blowing. It’s by far my favorite Spider-Man movie to this day. I enjoyed Homecoming, but it wasn’t a pioneer and it didn’t have the emotional impact this one had (the second one comes close though).
Sam Raimi literally brought iconic images to motion on the big screen in a way Singer hadn’t quite managed with the first X-Men. It’s a mark of dedication when a well-known director, who could choose any project he wanted, instead chooses to invest years of his time in the sequels. His love for Spider-Man is as palpable as any frame in these three films.
It was also one of the first films I ever took my time to rewatch while it was still playing in theatres (the others being the first X-Men and the SW prequels).
Furthermore, Maguire nailed the loner outcast aspect of Peter Parker, not to mention the great chemistry with Kirsten Dunst (the perfect Mary Jane). This was also my introduction to James Franco, who owned the character of Harry and gave it multiple layers. Willem Dafoe brought gravitas and humanity to Norman, turning the caricature into someone relatable (seriously, even in bad films, a Dafoe performance is worth the price).
The movie reiterated the basic principles of the traditional hero’s journey. Power, dedication, responsibility. Uncle Ben’s death is a signature moment in storytelling. To me, it was the first time I had a literal gut reaction to personal loss. It motivated Peter Parker and it motivated the viewer in a way Batman losing his parents had never quite pulled it off for me.
The visual effects may be slightly dated now, but it still conveys the character’s otherworldly agility. Technology had finally caught up to the vision of these filmmakers. And the soundtrack is one of Elfman’s finest.
Seeing the common folk defending Spider-Man from the Goblin was a particular moment of delight. Heroism is knowing when to stand up and make yourself heard. Post 9/11, it conveyed catharsis.
2002 was a particularly memorable year for heavy blockbuster releases. One of my favorites, that’s for sure. Spider-Man led the pack, but we also had SW2: Attack of the Clones, LOTR: The Two Towers and the second Harry Potter. Definitely a year to remember. There was no way a pedestrian film such as ST: Nemesis was going to stand a chance given the competition back then.
Funny thing is, of all those movies, I’d say Spider-Man is the one that aged the best for me :) I loved it when it came out, but despite being a general prequel defender, AOTC is the weakest by far (IMO). And as for The Two Towers…well, Faramir taking the ring is the closest I’ve ever come to walking out of a movie in rage.
I actually have really fond memories of Nemesis though – at the time I had only ever seen a few Star Trek TNG episodes so was not really a fan in any sense of the word. Some friends and I went on a post-winter finals trip to Canada to drink the weekend away/celebrate (the drinking age is lower than in the US so it’s a popular Michigan destination) but of course, being nerds, we ended up going to see the new Star Trek movie :) I had fun with it, but I had nothing to really compare it to or expect.
@63/LisaMarie: I don’t think Nemesis is a particularly bad film, as far as Trek is concerned. It has a half-decent ending, it respects the characters, and it gives room for some philosophical debate regarding identity & free-will vs. genetic design/behavior influence. But it’s also one that really didn’t bring anything new to the franchise, and was ill-timed in its release (as I said, 2002 was a very competitive year).
I’m pretty sure its financial failure in light of the competition was what prompted Paramount to rethink the Trek movies as high budget blockbuster front-loaded hitters. Once J.J. hit it big with Mission Impossible, it was an easy decision for the execs to make.
@@@@@8. ChristopherLBennett
Fun fact for the day, Emma Stone is actually a natural blonde. She died her hair red for Superbad, which is often cited as her breakout role, and the color has become iconic to her.
I always figured that Peter had to use his spider senses to monitor the chemical reactions in order to create the web fluid. While any chemical should be able to be replicated in perfect laboratory conditions, it would explain how a high school kid was able to whip the stuff up in his bedroom given his meager resources.
As for the shooters, they probably take incredible reflexes and possibly strength in order to get the fluid to emit properly as webbing. Again, that’s a problem for the engineers, but not for someone who can just throw it together and get it to work just fine for himself.
While Peter could make a fortune selling his inventions, he would never dream of doing so. No matter how much benefit they could offer the world as a whole, he would not be able to live with himself if someone used one of them… irresponsibly.
@65/Devin: I know Emma Stone is a blonde, but I was referring to Bryce Dallas Howard, who played Gwen in Spider-Man 3. The irony of that film is that they had a natural blonde (Kirsten Dunst) playing the redheaded MJ and a natural redhead (Howard) playing the blonde Gwen.
Incidentally, it’s an odd double standard that actresses are more likely to dye their hair to match the comic-book characters they’re playing than actors are. In the comics, Jimmy Olsen is a redhead, but with the exception of Tommy Bond in the 1948-50 serials, every live-action Jimmy has been brown-haired, or blond in the case of Smallville‘s Aaron Ashmore. Matt Murdock (Daredevil) is another redhead who’s been played exclusively by brown-haired actors. And Barry Allen (the Flash) is blond in the comics, yet all three live-action Barrys have been brown-haired.
@66/renfield1969: I gather there was some story that posited that Peter’s spider abilities gave him an instinctive knowledge of how to create the web formula, although that doesn’t make much sense, since I doubt spiders have any idea what chemicals are in their webbing.
As for the webshooters, they don’t require any great strength to activate, since the webfluid cartridges are pressurized. The spray is triggered by touching an electrode in the palm, and Peter rigged it so that it responded only to the pressure of his two middle fingers, so that he wouldn’t accidentally trigger them by clenching his fists. That’s the origin of Spidey’s trademark “thwip” gesture with the index finger and pinky extended. It’s not an easy hand position to achieve without practice.
The movie has its flaws (the goblin armor, ugh), but it had good casting, a nice script (despite the lack of Spidey quips) chockful of comic references, and obviously Raimi understood and respected the source material. The second Raimi movie would be almost perfect.
The lack of mechanical web shooters was a pity, because Peter building those are what help is remember he’s a genius. Yes, it’s a bit implausible, but hey, this is a comic book superhero.
@17 – Chris: One thing I remember finding weird about the Raimi film is that Peter apparently has comic book pro-level drawing abilities, as he sketches different costumes. As for the wrestling career lastling longer and the promoter giving him the costume, they did do that in an origin re-telling miniseries (or possibily the Season One GN) some years ago, IIRC.
@20 – Chris: I love that scene from Man Of Steel #6.
@22 – crzydroid: In the comics, Peter always wears his webshooters under his clothes, and usually the whole costume except the mask.
@67 – Chris: Yeah, but controlling the exact amount of pressure that you need to emit the specific thickness of web you need for a specific swing, angling the shot, swinging around, etc; all that might need Peter’s enhanced abilities.
@68/MaGnUs: When I visited Manhattan while researching my Spider-Man novel Drowned in Thunder, I realized there was another issue that gets ignored in the comics: wind. It’s incredibly windy between skyscrapers in Manhattan, and there are all sorts of powerful currents blowing in various directions. Any gossamer thread is probably going to get blown in some random direction rather than anchor itself precisely where it’s aimed from a hundred feet away. So web-swinging, as shown, is probably a complete impossibility in real-world terms. In the novel, I asserted that Peter used his spider-sense to anticipate whether a web line would hit or miss and avoid the dangerous shots, so that when his spider-sense was impaired, so was his web-swinging.
The new Marvel’s Spider-Man animated series paid lip service to the wind question too. When Peter was first learning to use his new webshooters, his first shot just curled up uselessly in the wind, and he increased the nozzle pressure to compensate.
The one thing that really bugged me about this movie is that they tried to create artificial drama by having Peter say nothing when Harry blames Spider-Man for his father’s death. All he had to do was tell him, “Spider-Man didn’t kill your father, the Green Goblin did.” It’s just as plausible, and it has the virtue of actually being the truth. He’s already established that he has a connection with Spider-Man, if Harry asks him how he knows that. And Raimi could still have had his cake and eaten it too, simply by having Harry choose not to believe him.
@70/Matthew: Except that one of Peter Parker’s defining traits is an overinflated sense of guilt. He probably did blame himself for Norman’s death on some level, and thus maybe felt he deserved Harry’s blame.
Oh, of course it’s impossible. But that concern flew out of the window a long time ago. :)
@67/ChristopherLBennet
My apologies for assuming which Gwen you were talking about. I always forget that Gwen is in Spider-Man 3. Truly a victim of content-cramming.
This movie, although I could quibble with bits and pieces, was a turning point for me. There were OK superhero movies before this one, but none I enjoyed quite as much as this one. Before this movie appeared, I would dread hearing that my favorite heroes were going to be in a movie–as my first thought was how their stories were going to be butchered by Hollywood. But starting with this one, I began to look forward to superhero movies.
And J Jonah Jameson is one of the best comic characters ever created, so I definitely appreciated JK Simmons and his pitch perfect portrayal.
Loved the movie, I also think like some above that it was a bit slow paced, and that Toby is too dull not only as Spidey but sometimes even as Peter. also agreeing that when he gets angry and openes his eyes that way it looks rather like he cracked being a nutcase. No real chemistry between him and MJ, unlike the superb, SUPERB chemistry between Ema and Garfield (best part of ASM movies). “Power Rangers” outfit – hehehe exactly. If it’s not enough that they focused on Peter the depressed, it was too much to give us at the same time the version of MJ the depressed, if one of them had his cheery side it would balance them out. JJJ – perfect.
I must underline the importance of Spiderman’s witt and jokes – between Batman, Superman and maybe Wolverine, as being the most popular comic heroes, Spidey was a refreshing change with not being so dark, serious, and so on, if someone wanted a serous character they would have a lot to pick from but Spidey and Deadpool are mostly alone as funny main characters. I think it’s his main feature that makes him so high on the popular list. That’s why I adored Garfield’s version (not seing Holland) and was deeply dissapointed that they nearly well cancelled AMS. Bad choices for the bad guys in my opinion, have no other explanation for the second AMS to not earning enough.
And I also agree with the plot hole, of reasoning out why Goblin wanted him to join him, and for what goal?
It was a great movie, but on many levels too dated for me to enjoy it as much today.
Unlike previous opinions on Harry in Raimi’s version, Franco was to “normal” for psycho Harry in my opinion. That dude in ASM could make the best Goblin up to date, but we’ll never know…
Schwartz: Do yourself a favor and watch Spider-Man: Homecoming. Trust me.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
Agree with krad.
I love, love, love this movie!!!! Im-not-so-ho, it was the first superhero comics adaptation to get it right since SUPERMAN. Everything worked. Casting, plot, dialogue…
I know a lot of people/fans hated the organic webs, but to me it always made sense that Peter’s “mutation” would include that ability. In fact, what never made sense to me in the comics was that there was always a danger of the “web-fluid” running out–I don’t remember, Keith, but was this ever a plot point, and if so, how often? I mean, it always seemed to me rather convenient that Peter always had enough of the stuff–a plot contrivance, to my way of thinking…although I do understand that it was Stan’s way of showing Peter’s scientific brilliance to the audience.
@78/Mindy Newell: Oh, Spidey running out of web fluid at inopportune times is a frequently-used plot device in Spider-Man comics. It’s a handy way to put him in danger by having his cartridges run dry in midair or in mid-battle. It’s part of the “Parker Luck” that they’re always running out at the worst times.
In the ’90s, there was a plot where Peter redesigned his webshooters with LEDs that lit up to alert him when a cartridge was low. I think more recent writers have forgotten this, though.
Also, organic webs get depleted if he’s stressed out or has used them too much. Don’t they even do this in the third film of this series?
@80/MaGnUs: But that’s just one of the many cool things you can do with webshooters and cartridges. Like that time Peter needed to create a distraction and threw a pressurized web cartridge in a fireplace so it would explode a few minutes later. In my Spidey novel, I had Spidey figure out a way to use his web cartridges to immobilize a robot he couldn’t tackle with strands of web alone. Then there are all the times in the comics that Peter’s fiddled with the chemical formula of his web fluid to achieve some specialized function, like adding a solvent for the Rhino’s indestructible armor, or mixing in garlic oil to deal with vampires. Again, the worst thing about the organic webshooters is that they remove the scientific ingenuity that’s a key part of Peter Parker’s character and Spider-Man’s strategies.
Oh no, I completely agree with you on that topic: the shooters and formula signify Peter’s genius. I was just making an aside.
When Stan Lee died, it had been nearly a decade since I last saw this movie. I had fond memories of it, but I hadn’t ever gone back to it. In honor of his passing, I decided to pop it in the DVD player. I was pleasantly surprised at how much I wound up enjoying it. There’s a sincere earnestness to this film that you just don’t see in today’s superhero movies. That’s not a criticism of modern superhero films, simply an observation. Yes, it can be corny. Yes, it can be cheesy. But those are some of the dangers that come with being earnest, and that’s okay. This movie wears its heart on its sleeve, saying “We don’t care what anyone else says, we love Spider-Man”. And I can’t help but say “Yeah, so do I”.