I've been holding back my anger towards the haters out there who are criticizing Andrew Garfield's Peter Parker for long enough. After reading article after article on the new Spider-man reboot and seeing angry comment after angry comment of people raging against Garfield's Parker, I just can't hold it in any longer. So what am I going to do? Write an angry article to combat all those angry comments of course!
Now before everyone gets all pissy and tells me that I know nothing about Spider-man and that my opinion is worthless, I am going to tell you exactly who I am to judge. I am a Spider-man fan. I have more Spider-man comics than any other comic, Spider-man was the first hero I ever loved; Spider-man is what made me get into comics in the first place. I've read almost every era of Spider-man; the Stan Lee stuff, the Romita era, the Venom era, the Clone Saga, J.M.S's run, Ultimate Spider-man, the Brand New Day stuff, and Dan Slott's "Big Time". I know Spider-man, I know his story, I know his villains, I know his girlfriends, hell I even know his clones. I have also seen the three Raimi films. I'm not one of those people who says that Raimi's movies sucked and that the reboot will be perfect. I love the Raimi films(although I wouldn't use love to describe my feeling for the third film). I don't think the reboot will be perfect, how could it be? I, just like most of you, hated the thought of rebooting the franchise when I first heard the news. But after thinking about for a long time, I think the reboot will be good for Spider-man fans. But enough of my history with Spider-man, its time for me to get on to the hate comments filling up every article about the reboot. Most of these comments focus on Andrew Garfield being cast as Peter Parker. People say that there is no way he could top Tobey Maguire's performance. Really? Did Tobey Maguire really do that good of job? Don't get me wrong, I think Tobey Maguire is a great actor, just not necessarily a great Peter Parker. I enjoyed his performance, and the movies are still great, but there are still some problems with Tobey's Peter.
First of all, he never really came off as that smart to me. Peter is supposed to be really smart, and Tobey has his moments, but he didn't convey that sense of young genius. Before people try to point out the many moments when Peter said something really smart let me remind you that those are just moments. Tobey's Peter only seems smart when he's saying or doing something extremely nerdy. This means we get a lot of "Look at him, look at him, he can't catch the bus! Or talk to a girl! He MUST be nerdy!" moments. Or the, "Listen to him! I can't understand a word he's saying! All this scientific jargon MUST mean he's smart!" But think about it, when did Peter Parker actually do anything smart in those three films? Getting good grades doesn't count. In the comics, Peter always used his smarts to think of ways to beat his villains, but in the movies he just beats them up. I'm not saying there can't be fights, just that Peter should show a little more ingenuity than the simple "web, punch, repeat" routine that we get in the first three films. He didn't even deduce that the symbiote was weak to sonics, he just realized it in the middle of the big fight. Tobey does successfully capture the "gee whiz" aspect of Peter wonderfully, but if there was one aspect of Peter I'd be willing to sacrifice it would be that one.
The worst part about Tobey's Peter, and probably the worst part about all the Raimi films, is that he isn't funny in costume. AT ALL. Peter doesn't make a single joke in the entire three films. Calling someone "Gobby" isn't a joke. In the comics Spidey was always joking, to the point where he's almost a more family friendly version of Deadpool. This joking thing brings me to my number one complaint about people who hate on the Spidey reboot. They say it will be too "emo". People just don't get tired of calling James Garfield an "emo" Peter Parker. But from the footage shown at comic-con, it appears like he will actually be making jokes in this film. And is Tobey Maguire's Peter really less "emo"? He cries ALL THE TIME. In fact, I think about one fourth of Spider-man 3 was him crying, and another fourth was him dancing for goodness sake!
People always say that this movie looks too dark and that Spider-man is supposed to be fun. But the comics are pretty dark. Kraven burying Spider-man alive and then killing himself, police captain Jeanne DeWolf getting murdered by a serial killer, the Green Goblin killing Gwen, Carnage, the Lizard eating his own son, and Arana getting sacrificed by Kraven's voodoo family all come to mind as stories in the comics that were really dark, and really good. Spider-man is often at his best when he's dark. So what's everyone complaining about? Andrew Garfield's hair?
...I guess you have a point there.