My first article...okay... here I go:
The first time I ever came onto this site was in 2006. I had just seen the image of Kelsey Grammer's Beast from X-Men: The Last Stand, and I couldn't have been more excited. I stuck with the site searching for more news on all of these movies that were slated to come out soon; of course the big two were Spider-man 3 and X-men: The Last Stand. Unfortunately these were movies that everybody completely agreed on: they sucked. Now, I agree with half of that. X-Men 3 absolutley disappointed, but I'm in the minority that's able to admit that I enjoyed, and still enjoy, Spider-Man 3, despite it's obvious flaws. What I've noticed now though, after 7 years have passed since the unholy threequel, is that it still gets a bad wrap, and The Amazing Spider-Man 2 seems as polarizing a film as I've seen among users here, despite having the same problems. I haven't seen this since Man of Steel.
Before I get started, I'm going to point out that, like Spider-Man 3, I really enjoyed The Amazing Spider-Man 2. They're strikingly similar movies, but the point I really want to make is one of observation. Comic book movies are splitting the fanbases down the middle more often than ever now, and I couldn't be more confused about these reactions. I read an article a few nights ago about Marc Webb's sequel, and the amount of hatred and anger behind it just sort of irked me: it made bold claims about the film being an embarassment and an abomination. Obviously, this person is entitled to his opinion (yes, his: if you are unaware of gender, it instatnly is masculine, sorry ladies; that's just english.), but as I delved deeper into the editorial, or review, if you can call it that, I was most disturbed by what was blatant nit picking about character origins, miniscule details, super powers, and all around things that require suspension of disbelief. This is Spider-Man, if we've gotten into nit picking about logic of origins then we're clearly not getting the point. At times, it felt like he wasn't actually watching the movie. Now, I absolutely believe he watched it, but when people don't like something, they tend to misconstrue facts and events to better support their own opinions as fact.
As I read this, I couldn't help but think of one Mr. Harry S. Plinkett, the character from RedLetterMedia. A trend I've noticed about amateur critics since the Plinkett reviews began pick up steam, everybody began to criticize the way RedLetterMedia did: overanalyzing every little thing that can be wrong. The logic behind their use of that method is simple: the little things begin to clump together into larger problems with the movies they reviewed. They were small things, but they were important: opening shots, audience manipulation, wooden dialogue, unnatural character interactions, and illogical leaps and bounds of character development. The point with all of those is that the movies reviewed were usually parts of a franchise that ruined the characters and established continuity.
When I see this method of review used by critics looking for things to complain about, it's unnerving. Have we as a community stooped so low that we nit pick things like a fictional universe having an ethernet cable on a plane when we've established that their version of present time has incredible world changing technology. We can nit pick all day, but in the end, if you didn't like it, you didn't like it. I don't believe that those complaints are the real reasons people didn't like The Amazing Spider-Man 2.
I really liked this movie because I felt the emotional core of Gwen and Peter as the tonal center. I also thought it was 20 minutes too long and should have dropped the mystery about Peter's dad. These are opinions, and I'm not trying to sway people into my way of thought. I'm saying why I liked this movie sans personal attacks about taste, and why it's absurd to talk about the little things in this movie when the flaws are actually quite simple. This movie is not terrbily complex. But if I had to guess the reason why so many people don't like this movie, it would be the fact that it has very similar flaws and major problems as the ones found in Spider-Man 3. The reason others like it? It has an emotional center that keeps us involved despite the overwhelming number of threads.
Do you agree with my assessment of review? Is it okay for people to focus on the little things? Do people do it too much? Or should they keep finding problems with every scene? Sound off below!