Someone actually says that Spider-Man “does everything a spider does” in The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Which basically gives you an idea of how tone deaf the film is, if we were ever supposed to take it seriously at all.
Honestly, it’s really hard to tell.
Very minor spoilers for the film below.
It’s no hardship to say it because there’s never any question; this film is a slapdash mess. There are about three separate plots that only warrant one serious conversation apiece from the cast, the film is overlong by about a half hour, and the action is… well, it’s fine. The most exciting thing about the CGI in the film is how you can see Spidey’s suit is made of real fabric, even when he’s diving through the air!
For those who were hoping for a resolution on the mystery of Peter’s parents from the first film, it’s resolved alright. That isn’t to say that its resolved meaningfully or even all that interestingly, but you will definitely find out what the deal is with Richard Parker and his science-laden secrets. Peter will find out too, obviously, and it has no real affect on him and the plot whatsoever. But at least we can all finally put our curiosity to bed on that one.
With three separate villains already tagged before the film was released, no doubt fans were worried that a repeat of Raimi’s Spider-Man 3 was bound to occur, and there are places where the films are reminiscent of each other. There is too much to tie up in one film, after all. But Amazing 2 actually might come off the poorer exercise of the two, simply because it has no panache. There’s no driving style behind it, just a lot of white noise and cues for comics fans to slurp up. Because the creative team here seemed to think that paying homage to something was the same as doing justice to it.
It’s not.
It’s sad because the performances are really top notch all the way around. Andrew Garfield deserves a better film than this because he effectively is Peter Parker—he embodies everything that fans love about that mouthy teenager, all sweet swagger and badly handled excuses. Emma Stone is disarming as ever in the role of Gwen Stacey, even if she is forced to give the worst graduation speech ever at the start of the film, which is so clearly A Speech of Foreshadowing you wonder why someone doesn’t take Gwen aside and ask if she’s okay once they hand over her diploma.
There are wasted moments everywhere; the most moving scene of the film is between Aunt May and Peter, a beautiful moment between essentially mother and son that only really plays because Sally Field is always on point no matter what you give her. Yet again, the conversation doesn’t prove important later in the game at all. Also, Harry Osborn is suddenly here and vital to everything. We’re told that he and Peter used to be best buddies, and they play that vibe well, like two inseparable teenage bros… which is weird because we’re also told that they haven’t spoken since they were about nine years old. It’s painful because there were so many ways Harry’s story could have been rendered that would have allowed for some excellent moral ambiguity between the Parker and Osborn family stories, but it’s roundly ignored. Chris Cooper is wasted in one tired scene that featues Norman Osborn being evil and cruel simply because that’s just what Norman Osborn does.
Perhaps the person to be most offended for here is Jamie Foxx, who works so hard to make Max Dillon someone the audience can relate to, so that Electro has something to build on as a villain. Problem is, the tone surrounding him in the first half of the film indicates him as nothing but comic relief. When we’re supposed to start feeling for the guy, we’ve already written him off as a joke. There’s also a weird scientist who is allowed to experiment on Electro once he’s powered up, and the guy has the most overblown, camp German accent you have ever heard because we still like making quasi-Nazi jokes maybe?
There’s not much else to say… okay, there’s a lot more to be said, but that will have to be a very spoilery commentary saved for another day because the ending of this film is disappointing on every level of criticism you point at it. There’s really no making up for it. It doesn’t satisfy, it doesn’t teach us anything, and it certainly doesn’t make us excited for more Spider-Man.
Whatever your opinion on the Raimi films, that Spider-Man sequel ended with a well-placed “Go get ’em, Tiger.” For Amazing Spider-Man 2, all we’re left with is a static shock to the fingertips and an empty reminder to be hopeful. About what, you might ask?
Well, about Spider-Man, one would presume. Though after this film, it’s hard to know why.
Emmet Asher-Perrin will be back to talk about Gwen Stacey because, just, no. You can bug her on Twitter and read more of her work here and elsewhere.
Is there going to be a spoiler review? Cuz I’m dying to know if, well, you know.
~bit of a spoilery comment~
Wow, this review blindsided me. I saw the movie last night and loved it. There was a lot going on but I thought it all tied together really well. I thought all the actors did a great job. Dane Dehaan does a good Harry. The action scenes and CGI were on point. And I thought ‘that one scene’ was done so perfectly, just a great sequence there in my opinion, with the clock and the web and everything.
Maybe I’m just easier to please than most…
Can SOMEONE talk about weirdly racist this film is?
Electro begins the film as an idiot savant. He almost instantly becomes an angry black man who repeatedly, REPEATEDLY, refers to himself as the INVISIBLE MAN, in the film’s one poor attempt to recognize the social parallels. Then the only person who relates to him on anything like a personal level is a rich, 20-year-old, white, hetersexual male. It doesn’t work that way: You can’t acknowledge that hey, there are these huge social problems, but that guy’s also just crazy, and hey, at least these white people feel sorry for him!
@@@@@ 1. Aeryl
Wikipedia has a plot summary. CTRL+F for her name a few times will let you know, without spoiling the plot of the movie.
I thought the film portrayed very well that just swinging around being nice, trying to be a friend/hero, is not enough. Both villains came with their own baggage that set them up for their downward spiral, but they had a glimmer of hope that, ultimately, wasn’t resolved. The commentary on hope is a little cheesy, yeah, but it’s consistent.
There was also some good world-building. Not just at the end, re: Spidey’s rogues gallery, but you get a sense of Oscorp’s role in medicine/technology, and how all the major scientific presences play into that. It almost feels like an alt-history 2014 because the tech available to some people is fucking redonk.
I thought the Ravencroft stuff was a little too evil-just-because, and the music yet again struck me as a bit out of place (much as I love Zimmer).
Overall, I’m a big SM fan, and this movie did not disappoint.
Maybe I’m just out of touch, but I don’t understand why everyone thinks Andrew Garfield is such a great actor and how he’s Peter Parker. He’s just kind of half smug, half emotional the entire movie just like in ASM1.
The entire movie was A+ except for his scenes without the mask on for me. He just didn’t feel like a character that was anything, but serving the plot of the film and the needs of a teenage audience who has to see him kiss the girl. It’s super weird most of the time seeing him talk and interact with people as Peter.
Hey all,
There will definitely be a spoilery discussion of the movie next week! Where I will more implicitly discuss how certain elements were tackled. In case anyone wants to save their more spoilery talk for that.
@HulkGoneGreen – That made me suuuuuper uncomfortable as well. Yes.
@@.-@, Thank you.
If there are any Titan AE fans here could you tell me if a certain part of the ending was very eerily familiar. I was expecting to hear Planet Bob take over the musical score.
I know this film looks bad. But I have to go to support my drive-in. The move to digital is killing the drive-ins in upstate NY, which are struggling to buy the new digital projectors. This film is still available on 35mm, and so is showing at the drive-in.
I don’t really understand the bad reviews I read about this movie. It’s kind of a throwback to the older comic books to me. It’s a little cheesy, with the villains being overly villainous and announcing their names and so-on.
The action scenes were great though. Peter and Gwen’s chemistry was spot on. All the casting is amazing. And I thought the final scenes were well done as well.
I’m not saying it’s the greatest super-hero movie ever. Maybe not even as good as Raimi’s Spider-Man 2, but certainly better than 3 and certainly worth seeing by any fan.
thank you for this review. i watched the film, expected nothing and got even less. i hated it that bad. usually i am quite blindsided concerning marvel movies. i like even some of the worst…well not like but accept them as entertaining(coughghostridercoughcough). but sp2 was such a wast of far too much time. the stories didn’t make any sense the motivation of the villians(one minute biggest fan/friend next minute worst enemy).
***spoiler***
but some of the things that what annoyed me the most:
– peter’s parents were james and jane bond? wtf was all this fighting in the plane about???
– what a coincidence peter is bitten by a spider that was genetically engineered that only a real parker could benefit from its power??? rarely did i hear such horse poo.
– related to that…so they wored on these spiders for twenty years but youldn’t use them because the were coded to parker’s dna? they keep a project for twenty(!!!!) years that doesn’t show any results at all???
– the parkers had money to have a laboratory (granted: a self cleaning one that didn’t have any dust nor spiderwebs in it after 20 years) in an old traincar that pops up from the ground but didn’t think of investing in a decent lab???
– what secrets will peter find in his dad’s bag in sp3???
– as for the special effects, i know they are supposed to be big and maybe a bit over the top, but electro destoying times square was to me equivalet to a horse drawn planewagon being driven against a tree then explodes.
these are just some of the many stupid and sloppy things the i encountered watching spiderman 2.
crap movie.
I’ve kept out anything big spoilery comments; I’ll wait for the spoiler review to discuss those things.
This film really was all over the place. I thought some of its elements came together well in the end, but that didn’t make me forget how the various plots meandered aimlessly around for the first hour and a half.
For me, the film didn’t really rushed, so I’m not sure it was so much a problem of too much in the film – the writers just really did a poor job of tying their various plotlines together. Harry Osborn, Electro, the mystery of Peter’s parents, and Gwen/Peter – these storylines didn’t really interconnect at all until the end, nor were there really even any distinct thematic ties between them. There was no connection from one scene to the next, no cause-and-effect to the plot; it just seemed like random scenes thrown together, at least, until Harry’s assistant told him about Special Projects – and that was well over halfway through the movie.
It’s a shame, because DeHaan was amazing as Harry. I’ve never seen him in anything before, and he reminded me of a younger version of Benedict Cumberbatch – creepy yet sexy at the same time, and SUPER intense. I really wish the film had cut Electro and just focused on Harry/Green Goblin, because though DeHaan’s performance was fantastic, his storyline did feel rushed. We needed more time to establish him and Peter as friends (they did have great “bro” chemistry), and definitely more time to make the jump from slightly emo kid to full-on psychopath, because that seemed to come really fast.
I agree that the whole Electro plotline was just weird, tonally. He did come off as comic relief at first. The one saving grace for Electro for me (besides Jaime Foxx) was that the effects of his climatic showdown were pretty cool. Otherwise? I just don’t think he was necessary in this film.
I also had a real problem with the music in this film? Was that just me? There were just some weird choices. A few times the music just really tore me out of the film. I love Phillip Phillips’ ‘Gone Gone Gone’ but it didn’t really seem the right song for that particular scene. Again, tonally, it missed some marks, I think.
Um, do any of you guys even read comic books? And why is it every time a black actor is cast in a movie, it must be because the film makers are trying to make social parallels and what not? THAT is weirdly racist to me…
As a long time Spider-man fan, I actually loved this film. I suspected some bad reviews because certain things just never go over well with critics (ie multiple villains, too-evil supervillains, supernatural occurences that don’t obey the laws of physics (as if this isn’t actually a comic book movie), etc.). In fact, I think most people wrote the movie off as another Raimi disaster as soon as they heard there would be three villains. I can just imagine the critics ready to blast away before the opening previews had even finished.
For what it is worth, I think they handled three villains perfectly. Without giving away any spoilers, Rhino was perfect in my mind and I think the balance between the three in this movie opened the way for a sinister six movie perfectly (yes maybe it is possible to have SIX super-villains in one movie – god forbid it may be a comic book movie that lasts more than 1 and 1/2 hours – has everyone lost their attention spans?).
There are always moments of cheese in a comic book movie. If you don’t like this, maybe you should stick to historical dramas.
Yes Harry felt a bit rushed in this film, but I was okay with that since room is there for pretty much every character to come back in future movies, including Norman and Electro, and more character development can take place at that point.
I’m eager to watch the film again and really discuss this race issue everyone seems so upset about. Has anyone actually read Invisible Man? Maybe Ellison is racist as well? I’m curious what Jaimee Foxx would say because I suspect he is not racist. Perhaps the balance was not quite right here but it seems silly to assume that no one thought about this before the film was released.
I believe that fans of Spider-man will love this movie, but that those who are looking for an Best Picture stand-alone film will be disappointed. This movie was good for what it was and opens the way for considerable growth in future films (which I think was sort of the point).
@14, Because the movie went to great lengths to associate the story with what’s considered a seminal work on racism?
OMG. I love to geek out as much as the next person but somehow I think a lot of people are overthinking this movie waaay too much. I’m not a huge fan of this iteration of Spider-Man but on the whole this was a fun film and better than ASM1, admittedly a rather low bar to overcome. Personally I find that Andrew Garfield does nothing for the role, but in costume he was good enough. Like many others I thought the Max character was seriously over played as a socially defective idiot savant, and I highly doubt anyone even fractionally as dysfunctional could have ever held down any sort of a job. And yet when he gets power (pun intended) he rapidly goes from embarrassingly slapstick fool to super-cool mega-intense megalomaniac – now THERE’S a psychotic break for you! Stupid – yes. Racist – not so much, considering how utterly Peter Parker is portrayed as a moron and epic social fail. Still, the effects in the film were awesome and Spidey much cooler and more likeable. All in all good fun despite the holes.
@15 – Wow. I guess, in spite of the fact that I’ve enjoyed a slew of other comic book films, I should just stick to my historical dramas and Best Picture films (not really a fan of historical dramas, tbh).
It’s great that you enjoyed this film. You’re allowed to enjoy it, and you’re allowed to express that opinion. How about you do the rest of us that same courtesy, and not dismiss our negative opinions of the film based on your wrongful assumptions that anyone who didn’t like it isn’t a Spiderman fan or doesn’t get comics? I’d say there are quite a few Spiderman fans out there who didn’t like the film.
I think it’s a mistake to assume that Jamie Foxx’s casting as Max Dillon was intended as a racial statement. Granted, he was over-the-top as the nerdy Spider-Man fan. I just don’t see the comparison to Ellison’s book, though.
Foxx’s character was shown as being the kind of person who has no social life and no personal charisma. Most people forget his name by the end of a conversation. He’s got considerable talent, but gets no respect.
THAT is why he sees himself as invisible. Even when he creates a tremendous impact [albeit negative], someone else gets all the fame. He could have been Chinese or Armenian and had the same lines, with the same effect.
I have to agree with @smithnik. I didn’t get the term invisible man to connect to the book at all. It’s a phrase that has become part if our lexicon, and I think it was meant to be taken literally, not as a reference to literature. Plenty of people of all races feel like they’re invisible at times. It’s not hard in our society to feel like one matters to no one and nothing.
@18 Actually I agreed with most things you said in your comments and was responding in my comments to some of the earlier comments. Surprised you found my words offensive toward you. You may have felt a little more strongly that the film was all over the place than I did, but I didn’t have that experience as much. You are certainly entitled to your opinions. I actually think some people may justifiably feel this way. I think Harry needed more development as well, but overall feel good that we can see more in the future. I do find it funny and worthy of commenting on when people are up in arms about how unbelievable a comic book movie is however. I didn’t initially get that sense from you @18, but it sounds like you took offense anyway. @12 was who I had in mind, who seemed irritated that this movie was full of unbelievable action sequences and scientific impossibilities. I’m trying to figure out which is more “out there,” Peter being the only one to be affected by the genetically enhanced spiders simply because his father embedded them with his own DNA (random coincidence?), or the fact that there are thousands of genetically enhanced spiders in a room somewhere that have never bitten anyone except Peter and that Oscorp somehow doesn’t realize their potential for creating superheros (like is Peter the only one who ever entered the room?). I guess @12 finds option 2 more gratifying but to me both options are a little absurd if one really wants to debate this.
And of course some Spider-man fans will not like this film. I don’t think anything is absolute but in general I feel this movie responded more to fans than movie-goers in general, which makes me happy.
@19 and @20 I’m honestly not sure how I feel about the “racism” that is or isn’t in the film. I honestly didn’t find it offensive myself but I would be interested in other people’s opinions about this. I only brought up Ellison’s book because it seemed @3 was insinuating that the term “invisible man” clearly is a racial term. @3 also stated that the film was making an attempt to address social parallels. I’m not sure I agree 100% here either, but I think that if one believes the film was attempting a racial theme it is probably fair to say a pro-racism theme was not what everyone involved in making the film had in mind. It does seem to me that anytime you cast someone who is playing a character that traditionally is white it is fair to say that some viewers will take note of this and have a response. I simply think that when they cast Jaimee Foxx, they probably noticed. Whether they were making a statement or not, and what that statement was, seems to be other people’s arguments here, not mine. I think @14 has a good point that quickly identifying the film as racist might actually come across racist to some people. Honestly, just like I suspected that people would be up in arms about too many villains (3), I also suspected there would potentially be some reaction to the race politics in the film before it even came into theaters. One doesn’t need to see the film to anticipate these critiques. There is always someone ready to impress themselves with noticing something “intellectual” and try to be the first to point it out. So all I’m really doing on the race thing is playing a little devil’s advocate. I want to see the film again before I make any real opinions about this. I am however very curious to hear exactly what people have to say about this. I still haven’t heard anything that makes me “uncomfortable” but I’m interested in why other people felt this way. Maybe they are on to something, but so far I haven’t really seen anything mentioned that actually presents the film in a negative light in this area unless we are to assume that Max’s character was written as a social statement. Was everyone white in the film besides Foxx? I can’t remember, but I suppose some could argue that this contributes to a racist theme? Just curious to see a fully developed argument here instead of a few side comments about someone who noticed he referred to himself as an invisible man.