In 2012 Marc Webb (fitting name) rebooted the Spider-Man franchise to mixed reviews. Most people were crying "too soon", myself included. That being said, I liked more than I didn't about that movie. Now, two years later we get his second effort with The Amazing Spider-Man 2.
This movie takes place some time after the first movie, and Spider-Man is pretty comfortable now with his role as a hero. However, he's been dating Gwen Stacy, disregarding his promise to her dad to keep away in order to keep her safe. This sets up Peter Parker's conflict through the film of staying with her because he loves her, or staying away from her because he loves her. To make protecting her even harder, the big bads start flowing out from Oscorp (the main threat throughout being Electro).
Let's start off with the good this time around. One of the biggest positives about this movie is the chemistry and interaction between Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield, The Social Network) and Gwen Stacy (Emma Stone, The Help). This is good because they have the most screen time. I think the fact that they are dating in real life really shined through in this film. I thought they were great in first movie as well, and only got better. In ASM1 Garfield did a fine job as Parker/Spider-Man. So, he was a skater punk instead of a nerd....get over it internet. They got down the characteristics that I look for in his beginning days, he was really science smart and socially awkward. He slowly got more confident as he was developing and honing his abilities. We even got a little of that wise-cracking crime-fighter that I love from the comics. In ASM2 he's really grown into the role. We get a lot of the little snarky quips from him while fighting criminals. And they got rid of one of my biggest problems with his character portrayal in the first movie. Pardon my French, but he was a real dick to Aunt May (Sally Field, Forrest Gump). The relationship was much better in this new film. Dane DeHaan (Chronicle) also did a fine job as Harry Osborne. He walked that line of a young man on the edge when he is introduced. He falls off that edge into a downward spiral when he thinks that his old friend Peter has betrayed him.
Another thing to enjoy about this film is the action. The scenes of Spider-Man web-slinging through the city are quite fun to watch. And the fight scenes, I thought were quite well choreographed and shot. That brings me to one of my problems. Everyone else thought the fights were cool too. In a couple of the fight scenes, bullets are flying, Electro is shooting electricity everywhere and billboards are falling. All this time, does anybody run? No, they just stand there cheering on Spider-Man like it's a giant staged spectator sport. Luckily, like I said, the fight scenes were quite fun to watch if you could ignore all the other idiot gawkers within the film.
Now, I did really like the core players in this movie. I even liked Electro (Jamie Foxx, Django Unchained) for the second half of the movie, once his powers were fully realized and he went all bad-ass bad guy. When he is still nerdy Max Dillon however, it was over the top even for a comic book movie. I felt like he was doing one of his caricatures from his days on In Living Color. Paul Giamatti went a little overboard with his Russian accent too. Luckily we don't see much of him in this film. Speaking of villains, I do have to admit that I'm not super familiar with any of their backgrounds and origins in the comics. That being said, I don't know just how far they are deviating in these movies. All I can say is that I actually like how they are tying them all together. Sony wants to create a Spider-Man universe with more sequels and off-shoots and I can appreciate that good guys and bad guys alike are all being tied to this central core.
The end of this review is a good place for my biggest complaint about this film, the last 5 minutes or so. No spoilers. I'll simply say, I did not care for it. I really wish I could go into all the things that were wrong with those last few minutes, but of course that would be too spoilery. My wife was on the same page, and as we drove away from the theater we came up with a solution. We brainstormed our own ending (which didn't actually deviate much from what you see before the last five minutes), and pretended the actual ending didn't happen.
In conclusion, were there problems with this film? Yes, but I think the good slightly outweighed the bad. This movie is, as the title suggests, centered around Spider-Man himself, and I think Garfield does a great job. Take the Raimi films off the shrine for two seconds and just enjoy this movie for what it is. It's a fun little ride.
Rating: *******--- (7 out of 10)
Memorable Quote:
Peter: I was cleaning the chimney.
Aunt May: We don't have a chimney.
Peter: Whaaaaat?
