On May 1 of this year, I made a review for The Amazing Spider-Man 2 calling it The Dark Knight of Spider-Man of flicks and giving it a 9.5/10. To put it mildly, the review wasn't very well received. And it is easy to see why: the movie split the fan community in half, much like Man of Steel did the year before. However, I feel that that review was overzealous. I had only seen it once and it makes it difficult for me to judge films based on lasting appeal. So, from now on, I will only be reviewing movies as they hit Digital HD or DVD (depending on which medium I choose) so I have more time to process it. In order to set the record straight, I've decided to revisit this review and try to give it the real rating that I think it deserves. In order to do this, however, I will be breaking this movie down segment by segment, starting with...
Characters
Peter Parker / Spider-Man
Well, I guess we can start out by saying that I think, if there is only one thing this film does well, it is
Spider-Man. However, I don't think it did Peter Parker every well. Peter Parker's character isn't really touched upon that much, which may confuse some people as...aren't they the same person? Well, yes and no. Yes in the fact that Peter Parker does put on the costume
but when he is in the costume he takes on a different persona and becomes someone else. This was something the Raimi films failed at. They didn't capture the fun Peter was having behind the mask nor the fact that Peter Parker gained a certain level of confidence he otherwise wouldn't have with his face hidden. However, if you can give Raimi credit for one thing it is his portrayal of Peter Parker, which this movie seems to fail at. The first one, it can be argued, failed at it too but I would argue we saw plenty of the true to life Peter Parker
before he got his powers and even his initial shift after he got his powers. However, we don't really see Peter change as the film is nearing its final act and it transitions into Spider-Man's role rather than Peter's. And we never see Peter interact with anyone, truly, again. Sure, we see Peter interact, in this film, with Gwen but his relationship with Gwen is always going to be different than his relationship with his other supporting cast members. The same goes for Aunt May. Those interactions were nice but it doesn't show who Peter is. These scenes contain almost no depth, except for the revelation scene (which basically calls bullsh*t on the whole plotline) and it actually throws more question on Peter's motivations for finding out the truth about his parents. If it isn't to find out how perfect his father was or why he wants to be just like him then what is it for? He tells Aunt May that it isn't about him dreaming of his father when everything up to that point had been hinting that he was. We don't learn his motivations for thinking about his father. It is such a shame to see Peter Parker being sidelined in his own film. On the other hand, though, we did get to see Spider-Man truly act like Spider-Man which is the first time we've seen it.
Arguably the second most important character to the plot, she truly does bring out another great thing that Webb gets right in his interation: the relationship between Gwen and Peter. It is in no small part due to the real-life chemistry between Garfield and Stone but the scenes with them in it are (sorry for this) electrifying. However, we don't really know much about Gwen besides the fact that she is smart, beautiful and funny. She is Peter's rock and, in other words, the perfect girlfriend. She has no real flaws or no real purpose in the film except to be there in order to get killed so Peter is stripped of everything that truly matters to him. We don't know what her ambition is (besides a mention of going to Oxford to study molecular medicine). She has a convenient amount of knowledge about how to do things and what she knows about OsCorp. In the first film, she knew how to run the serum that acted as an antidote for the Lizard. In this one, she somehow knows, not only Max, but the exact specs of the power grid. How did she, who was an intern only a few months ago, able to get access to the grid specs? Were these just shared with everyone at OsCorp? Or were they able to look up on the internet? If they were that readily available, it is a shock that no one attacked the power grid during that year long montage (at the beginning of the film). In other words, she is Lois Lane from
Man of Steel who simply shows up wherever the plot needs her to be. The conflict with the relationship, though, that comes from getting into Oxford is an interesting conflict that threatens to tear Peter and Gwen's relationship apart. The scenes they share make up, for the most part, the seeming lack of depth that Gwen has. She acts as a foil to Peter, which works for the most part, but gets tiresome sometimes. Well...at least we won't have to worry about
that anymore.
Max Dillon / Electro
Nothing can really be said about Electro that hasn't already been said by many critics of the film. The biggest thing is that, while Spider-Man and Peter Parker are sort of like two separate characters, they both share the same sense of humor and the same heart, while Max and Electro are two
completely different characters. Max is a walking cliche, a page ripped right out of Joel Schumacher's playbook. In fact, he is practically a carbon copy of Edward Nigma from
Batman Forever. While that certainly isn't he worst Batman film, it really isn't the best place to draw from for a villain either. Max is seriously lacking any depth apart from being in love with Spider-Man and being a loser that no one cares about. It seems like, and the movie even awknowledges it, that that is where his personality ends: unloved, isolated, creepy and in love with Spider-Man. The Times Square sequence with Max makes sense at the beginning, though. His turn against the cops makes sense: he did nothing wrong and then they start throwing gas canisters at him for looking weird. Max, understandably so, acts out against the police. They start shooting him. This entire sequence probably would've yielded better results if Max really ended up losing it before Spider-Man shows up and then Spider-Man starts fighting him due to Max killing people instead of Spider-Man trying to talk him down. Max's turn, this way, feels less real. While Spider-Man tried to protect the police, Max goes from liking Spider-Man to disliking Spider-Man for something that clearly had nothing to do with him. This quick turnaround also leads to Max turning on the people of New York, this one a little more understandably so, and he starts zapping people. From here on out, though, we see Electro and not Max. And Electro is the defintion of goony but badass. He really does play out much like a pawn but he really does have a lot of power at his fingertips and it really makes him into a cool villain. It is a shame that a guy like Jamie Foxx had so little to work with and Electro had to spawn from such a lame origin story.
Rounding out the "big four" of characters (and character I'll actually review) is Harry Osborn. This storyline, for me, really stole the show. His chase for a cure to his seemingly incurable disease is the thing that really drives the plot of the story. If we didn't have to deal with Electro and the first hour was about building Harry to the point of desperation he gets to an hour and a half into the film, we could've been in for a real treat. Harry Osborn's motivations make sense and the need for help from Peter feels natural. However, Peter refusing to give the blood didn't make much sense to me, which is why I think they should've put the whole parents storyline into the first film to get it out of their system. If Peter
knew that the spider venom was only coded to his DNA, then it would make sense why he couldn't a) tell Harry that he could use his blood, b) tell him why he was protecting him and c) how he was protecting him. With Peter thinking that the cross species were destroyed, it would've made the plotline more understandable. However, it made Peter Parker, again, look like a dick who didn't care about his best friend. Harry seems completely justified in being angry with Spider-Man for what happened to him and why he decided to go after the spider venom. Harry Osborn could've been a strong villain that really rivaled the likes of Loki from the MCU and Two-Face from
The Dark Knight trilogy. Unfortunately, juggling Electro along with Harry forced the rushing of the confrontation between Peter and Harry so that they could kill Gwen off at the two hour mark. Harry's transformation and quick turn on Peter feels completely unnatural and unnecessary except for the point in killing Gwen off. The Green Goblin is, yet again, a case of cliched villain but he is even more rushed than the likes of...well, any rushed villain you can think of. It truly is a shame that we have yet another character with wasted potential.
Final Score (Characters):
Plot
Peter's Parents
This, unfortunately, is a plot inherited from the first
The Amazing Spider-Man film that inexplicably left this story out. This film would've been so much better if those in charge of the first one had had the foresight to finish "The Untold Story" in the first one instead of leaving it dangling. Aside from the reasons already mentioned in the passage above, it has to unnecessarily force yet another subplot into the story. It also has to build up to Peter finding a clue that should've, honestly, been discovered in the first film just based on the logic alone. When Peter should be dealing with the fact that his uncle and (to a lesser extent now) his parents are gone, Uncle Ben gets sidelined (again) in favor of continuing after the parents subplot. While it is handled well for the situation that Orci and Kurtzman are put into, it is unfortunate that they had to deal with it in the first place. It just feels completely out of place in the movie or, maybe, it would've felt in place if the only other storyline was that of Harry's disease. Unfortunately, it feels like the movie had moved on from the plot only to bring it back up. It really is the biggest culprit in making this film seem like a mess.
I spent a pretty decent amount of time on this with the Harry Osborn character piece but I'll revisit it again. This seems to be one of the two well-done plots in this film. Norman's unknown or unusual disease would make for an interesting reason why there isn't a cure for it. While the departure from the comics in killing Norman Osborn off might make a few people made, it really did work for me. There seems to be more of a generational succession in the ongoing family fued between the Osborns and Parkers which is an interesting dynamic and it also provides a better drama than having Peter's best friend's dad kill his girlfriend to just Peter's best friend. Removing that degree of separation makes the story all the more tragic for Peter. He no longer has his best friend and he no longer has the person he loved most. Harry's assumptions and jumps make sense to the story except for one thing: Norman lived until he was 63 years old yet Harry acts like his time is imminent. Perhaps the screenwriters should've made it clearer that what Norman did to extend his life either wouldn't work for Harry or Harry just doesn't have those resources anymore. That would be the only problem with this story as every other part of it works well and completely makes sense. It also ties into why OsCorp is developing all these dangerous things and why Osborn was willing to stop at nothing to make sure he stayed alive.
The whole Ravencroft thing was an alright plot but it really didn't feel complete. So, OsCorp was working with Ravencroft and experimenting on people that were in there to create things. While it doesn't really yield anything (besides Harry being kicked out of his position as C.E.O.) it does create the potential for more ways villains like Vulture or Doctor Octopus could come out of the woodwork. The possibility and potential it has as a storyline is one of the things not yet ruined and hopefully it doesn't get squandered in the future. But, yet again, there really isn't much to talk about here.
Peter & Gwen: Oxford
I touched on it briefly in the section above but I figure, since it is one of the, if not
the, biggest plot in the film, it deserved a little more love. Webb wasn't lying when he said that Peter and Gwen's love story is the driving force of the film. It was a really good thing that they decided to ride this dying storm because Garfield and Stone really sell this romance. Peter realizing that he can't break the promise to her father and Gwen saying that she wants to make her own decisions is something that really makes this story unique. Usually it is the girl who gets in the way of the romance, whether it be in
Iron Man 3 or in
The Dark Knight it seems to be a growing trope in superhero films. Webb, rightfully so, steals the romantic problems that Peter and Mary Jane had in the original trilogy and uses it more effectively here. Peter is the one now putting the roadblock between the two of them. In fact this plot seems to be exactly the same as the one in
Spider-Man 2 with the marriage substituted for the scholarship to Oxford. The two key differences are that 1) there is real chemistry between the leads this time and 2) there is no happy ending to be seen here. Unfortunately, this is another plotline that felt a little rushed. In order to make sure Peter and Gwen were together for the end of the film, they needed to bring a resolution to the conflict at the hour and a half mark and not the two hour mark. In order to make sure the tragedy happened, more screentime had to be given to this conflict earlier on which would've been fine if Webb didn't have to navigate through studio mandated bullsh*t in order to reach the climax. However, the strength of this plot really does fall on the chemistry between the two actors which is remarkable. This is definitely
the strongest romance in any CBM film
ever. It's a shame that it had to end so soon and without as much screentime as it truly deserved.
Final Score (Plot):
OVERALL
The film has a large number of issues, there is no denying that. With one massive failure of a character (Electro) and two face-palm worthy characters (Dr. Kafka and Aleksei Systevich), the film could've certainly done with more character work. But what the film does right it really does right. It packs an emotional punch where it is needed. It gets dark when it needs to get dark. It's tone really feels ripped right out of a comic book, for better or worse, switching to what is necessary for the many, many things going on in it. Spider-Man is really done right, which is a success story in and of itself. The chemistry between the characters is truly excellent and makes sense. If
Marvel Studios made a Spider-Man film, I bet it would feel a lot like this: with lame villains but really great heroes and great chemistry between the leads. Sure, if it was a
Marvel Studios production, it would certainly be closer to the bottom of the list due to the failures that are evident in its worldbuilding which reminds me a lot of
Iron Man 2. The film isn't that mediocre but that is thanks to the strength of its performances and the successes that the emotional points give us and the strengths of two of the best plots outweighing the weaknesses of the other two.
FINAL SCORE (OVERALL)
Well, that is my redone review for
The Amazing Spider-Man 2. As always, feel free to post in the comments section below but, please, please, please keep it courteous and do not deliberately call people names. After all, they are just opinions and shouldn't be used to as a basis to attack someone on intelligence or anything else. Thanks for reading and good night!