The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014)

I do like the Peter Parker/Aunt May cast of ASM2 better than the Raimi cast. I could even warm to the new Green Goblin if they gave him more screen time.

Heck, I even liked Electro and was happy he wasn't in a green suit with yellow lightning bolts on his head.

My issues with this movie are all with the script.

 

I always thought Peter was like that as Spidey because the anonymity of the costume let him be the person he wanted to be without the social repercussions.

Kinda like how people talk crap on the Internet because no one knows why they really are!

 

I saw this with my nephew a few days ago. This was his first theatrical flick. I feel terrible that he has to go through life knowing this was his first projected film. He liked it... I guess that's all that counts... but WOW what a stinker. Foxx felt like a combo of Otis in Superman and Riddler in Batman Forever. Hans Zimmer's musical cue for the character was horrible.

Raimi's Spider-Man 3 was bad but not as bad as this turd.

It felt like a series of videogame vignettes with mid-90s Fox prime-time soap opera scenes thrown in for "character development."

The only thing I liked about ASM2 was the suit. I thought it was spot-on (which does not mean much for Affleck's Bat suit (which I dig), but that's for another thread).

 

It still sucked rubber donkey lungs.

Gee, that's a little bit of a giveaway, don't you think? (For those who don't remember Spiderman issues #121-122 from 1973...)



I'm still bummed that the new movie ret-conned Harry Osbourne into being the Green Goblin, rather than doing it with Norman Osbourne (the father) as it was in the comic book. This to me was a bizarre plot change that made no sense, and the only reason why they had to do it was to somehow explain the absence of Harry in the previous film. I don't think James Franco was good casting in the last Spiderman movies; the comic book Harry was almost as nebbish and nerdy as Peter Parker, only with a lot more money, and Franco looked like a male model... which was no the comic book character. But Dane DeHaan did look creepy enough to sorta/kinda work physically.

There's a lotta screwing around with comic book plots when they do the screenplays, and a lot of it bugs me because they're tampering with legends that have been around for 50 or more years. I can understand some changes, like putting the characters in present day, having cellphones, the internet, and all that stuff, but a lot of it just strikes me as egotistical producers and execs p!ssing in the punchbowl.

 

Well I don't mind switching things around every so often, because let's be real, even the comics don't adhere to their own continuity much these days, but it just felt forced and too quick to have Harry become the Goblin at this point. This and Gwen's death should have been the climax of ASM3 IMO.

The fact is there is always going to be some tinkering with "the legends" of these characters, partially because, yes, film makers want to put their own "stamp" on things, but in the case with many of these characters, there is really no iron clad canon that goes from point A to point B. Take Superman for instance. Just in the last 30 years in the comics, his origin and back story and continuity has been rebooted at least four times, most recently when DC COMICS did their NEW 52 relaunch. Yes, his basic origin, Powers and even the costume have largely remained the same, but many other things have not. When a movie screen writer sits down to write a Superman movie, which Superman do they use? The bare knuckled socialist leaning leaping vigilante and Nazi thrasher of the 30's and 40's? The invincible fanciful father figure and defender of all things American and apple pie of the 50's and 60's? The somewhat brooding aloof alien demi-god of the 70's and 80's? The married, domesticated Farmboy yuppie of the 90's and early 2000's ?or the current younger, armor wearing one of today? Granted with Spider-Man and other Marvel characters it's a bit easier as there are not as many conflicting fictional histories, but
when writing a movie about a character like this, you have to cherry pick to some degree, and that sometimes means certain bits of canon get either simplified, omitted or twisted around for the sake of the story that the screen writer is trying to tell.

 

I kind of got that Norman Osbourne WAS a green goblin on his death bead, with his green pallor and hooked nails.

 

These movies basically exist so that Sony can continue to hold the rights to the character.

 

True, and they've got enough money to keep them looking good and draw an audience looking for a spectacle. I suppose that if it ever got Superman IV bad, Disney might be able to come up with enough cash to get the rights back and protect their property. I have to say that I'm bored of the Spider-Man and X-Men films, and the prospect of a Fantastic Four reboot does not excite me. Eventually the audience will stop showing up and the ticket sales won't justify the effects and marketing budgets.

 

For what it's worth, "The Amazing Spider-Man 2" is already available for pre-order in both 2D & 3d blu-ray at Amazon.com...release date for it is expected to be Sept. 2nd...

 

I thought they existed to help Sony make another $700 million dollars!

 

That too, but you know Sony realizes that Disney would love to have Spidey under Marvel Studios and intergrade him into the AVENGERS franchise, as in recent years, Spidey has been an Avenger at various times. So Sony will keep churning out Spider-Man movies of varying degrees of quality until they run dry at the box office just to keep the licence. Judging from ASM2 success in terms of revenue, I don't see things changing soon, unless Disney makes Sony an offer they can't refuse.

 

Red Letter Media review to the rescue.



The synopsis?

Hollywood needs to exile the two script writers due to not really writing a proper script...again.

Just a sequence of pre-imagined action sequences with some vague bits to try to to link them all together.

 

I saw this last week and wasn't impressed. Electro is a needy wimp, you get a Green Goblin that is sort of like the Green Goblin, but not really, and Aunt May decides to train to be a nurse, and within two days she is working in a hospital giving people orders during a blackout.

 

I think I'll wait until the 25th anniversary of the film when movies are so bad this will look like a masterpiece.

 

Mediocre to bad....the story made little sense beyond a series of set pieces. There was an element of camp in some of this that reminded me of Joel Schumacher bad.

New Writers. New Directors needed desperately. Sam Raimi n his worst day never made a movie quite this bad.

 

That was an extremely bizarre part of the story.

 

When they've got someone like Sally Field they have to give her something to do.

 

Yep, that's a good analysis. Sally Field looked at the script and said, "hey! I got an Oscar here! Give me more to do!"

 

At which point, Webb called in one of the four screenwriters and said "Quick! Field wants more to do, give me some scenes!" to which the screenwriter responded "What's her motivation? How do I tie it in with the rest of the story?" and Webb replied "Does it matter?"

 

I'm feeling even better about this prediction now...

Okay, I'll stop...

Shalom, y'all!

L. Bangs

 

I hope you're right, but my fear is that stupid audiences will flock to crap like the new Transformers movie, which looks worse the more I see of it. Just a mindless, stupid, blow-'em-up movie. At least Spiderman has some actual acting in it once in awhile.

 

Well, I'm not counting Transformers as a superhero film (which is what my comment specifically referred to) but yeah, I'm sure it will do gangbusters, and I'm sure it will be terrible. Sigh...

Shalom, y'all!

L. Bangs

 

Where's the line? Is it a superhero movie? Is it a comic book movie? It's based on a cartoon show with giant robots, really just an extended Hasbro toy commercial, so by any definition, it's all crap. (Though I didn't hate the first movie.)

Spiderman is at least about people and sorta/kinda has a foot in reality, even if it's just a tenuous step. I don't get that from Transformers.

 

I'm honestly confused. Did you think I was claiming Transformers movies are superhero films, or are you claiming they are?

Thanks!

Shalom, y'all!

L. Bangs

 

Tell me the dividing line between this and a real superhero movie. It's a comic book movie, which to me is essentially the same kind of fantasy/sci-fi genre.