As has become pretty usual in my more recent reviews, the fact that this is also a Something Awesome entry also indicates the direction in which this review will lean, so I'll skip the quickie review and go right into the main body of the thing, starting with the characters, two characters in particular: Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy.
Now, I want to preface this next part with the following statement: I liked most of what Sam Raimi did with his Spider-Man movies. I even liked things about Spider-Man 3. Venom's design, for example, was pretty freakin' cool. I also didn't mind how cartoonish they made the Green Goblin in Spider-Man 1. I didn't mind how cartoonish the movies seemed overall, because most of my exposure to Spider-Man at the time had been the pretty bad '90's cartoon. But then something happened: I started reading Ultimate Spider-Man by Brian Michael Bendis and Mark Bagley. That series got me into reading Spider-Man comics, and while I have read far from all of them, I read enough to gain a very fast appreciation for Spider-Man characters like, for example, Gwen Stacy, who was poorly represented in the Raimi movies and ignored completely in the '90's cartoon. This awakening of sorts in relation to my awareness of my favorite comic book hero came about at about the same time as the cartoon series The Spectacular Spider-Man, which was not only notable for having an earworm of a theme song, but for being the first show on TV to ever accurately represent the world of the Webslinger, from his fighting style, to the pacing of his stories, to his relationships, to his sardonic wit. It was also the first time I'd seen Gwen Stacy correctly portrayed in motion picture and I was very happy.
Gwen Stacy had very recently, very quickly skyrocketed to the top of my list of favorite comic book characters. Needless to say, when The Amazing Spider-Man was announced and I heard that they were actually going to include Gwen in her correct role of Peters first girlfriend, I was cautiously optimistic. Her portrayal had to be perfect, or the movie would fail in my eyes. In fact, in my opinion, Spider-Man 3's greatest sin is not the emo Peter scenes, the misrepresentation and misuse of Venom, the one-too-many villains, the long list of plot conveniences, or the strong lean toward unnecessary retroactive continuity to make its story work, it is the misrepresentation of Gwen Stacy as a character her very first time on the big screen. Then I heard who would be playing Gwen, the lovely and talented Emma Stone, and my reservations were dissolved. I knew it would be great, and it was, twice.
For those of you who don't know, and who have not yet seen this movie, and don't mind HUGE SPOILERS, you should know something before we continue here: Gwen Stacy dies. She is recognized by the Green Goblin as someone close to Peter, so he throws her off of a bridge. Peter takes too long reaching her, and she has already built up enough speed that when he catches her the change in momentum snaps her neck and kills her. She dies in his arms. While the movie does things a little differently, it being a clock tower instead of a bridge, the death itself if very similar. Peter is too late, Gwen dies in his arms. I knew her death was coming, and it still shocked me and brought (the manliest of) tears to my eyes. It was perfectly acted, perfectly paced, and I think the fact that Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield are together in real life actually helped the scene to feel even more weighted. It was truly beautiful, and worthy of one of my favorite characters of all time.
I have talked a lot about how much I love Gwen, and I've said that I love her portrayal in these movies, but I haven't said why, and quite frankly I can't. You'll just have to read the books or watch the movie. I can explain why I love Spider-Man, and why I love Andrew Garfield's portrayal of him. Spider-Man is not the strongest or the fastest, but he's up there. He has power, and he is a good enough person to honor the sentiments of his late uncle and use that power to do what he can for others. The world beats him down as much as the villains he fights, and yet he keeps standing up and pushing forward toward a day when everyone can have hope for a better future, a day which might never come. While he's still a regular person with regular problems, he never lets those things defeat him. He keeps fighting until he literally can't fight anymore, and then he keeps fighting anyway, and he does so with a sarcastic wit that helps him to defuse the situation while putting a smile on the face of the reader. He's brilliant as a fighter and a scientist, and he genuinely cares about others, even his enemies. This is a complex character who must exhibit a complex range of emotions often and in quick succession, and Andrew Garfield plays the part perfectly, taking the role completely seriously, something that I'm not convinced Tobey Maguire ever really did. So, while I do enjoy (most) of the Sam Raimi Spider-Man movies, The Amazing Spider-Man is my Spider-Man.
The Amazing Spider-Man, a movie made in haste because Sony Pictures was going to lose their film rights to the character if a new movie wasn't in theaters by a certain, rapidly-approaching date. It had unpolished CGI, and a few plot holes, and it was cursed by the fact that it was once again the origin story of Spider-Man, something which the movie-going audience had just seen a few years earlier, but I still love it because it did so much with what it had to work with, creating something new and unique and yet still recognizable as the same story. The movie did new things with the origin of the Wallcrawler, tying it into the loss of Peter's parents at a young age, and giving their loss a new intrigue. It wove, in only a few scenes, a mystery plot involving his parents and their relationship with Oscorp Industries that is strong enough to span and drive forward the entire plot of the series. It wasn't the greatest movie ever, but I really enjoyed it. It did what the Disney/Marvel movies were doing: it gave the viewer new interpretations of the titular character's world while still giving then accurate interpretations of the characters and their motivations, and it was clearly leading to something. This brings us to The Amazing Spider-Man 2.
I'm not going to spoil too much. In fact, I think everyone with even a passing interest in Marvel Comics or Spider-Man should go see this movie, so I'm going to try not to spoil anything more than I already have above with the reveal of Gwen's death. Instead I'll just say that this movie was a movie for Spider-Man fans as much as it was for the general movie-going audience. Little Spider-Man specific and general geek Easter Eggs were littered throughout, like Peter's ringtone being the theme to the old Spider-Man cartoon from the 1960's, a few brief appearances by another great Spidey character, Felicia Hardy, or a cop car present at the final battle with Electro having the license plate 1701.
Mentioning Electro just now reminds me of something. What is it? Oh, wait a minute, have I forgotten to talk about the villains up to this point? Oh, my bad. I shall remedy this immediately: they were freakin' awesome! Electro was portrayed brilliantly by Jaime Foxx. He was believable as a sad and lonely man desperate for friends, desperate to be seen, who, when he's gifted with power enough to change his world, takes things too far. Dane DeHaan played a great Harry Osborn. His father dead and he himself slowly dying to the same disease, the usually good-natured Harry is driven to extreme measures to preserve his life, and he takes things too far as well. And Rhino was just Rhino. Don't know what I'm talking about, look it up. The villains in this movie were just as great as the heroes, receiving nearly as much development, and being driven by motivations that the audience can understand (except Rhino, but he's Rhino). I genuinely felt bad for Electro, and I wanted things with Harry to work out for the better. Their fates were much like Gwen's: I knew they were coming, but I still dreaded it, and it still hurt.
Now, was this movie flawless? No, far from it. Like Iron Man 2 this movie was setting up for a lot down the road, and it felt like it. While it resolved one major plot point from the first movie, it left another completely up in the air, untouched, and introduced many more unresolved plot threads. Anyone who is just interested in seeing a self-contained movie will likely feel that large portions of this film fall flat, the same way they did with the aforementioned Disney/Marvel film, but the movie is still very good. Scenes with emotional weight are given the weight they deserve, humorous scenes are funny, touching scenes are touching, and the story of this film itself still builds at a good pace and is resolved satisfactorily. It is a genuinely good movie, it just won't be everyone's cup of tea. As a Spider-Man fan, I loved this movie, and despite the fact that I freely acknowledge its flaws, I'll probably go see it again in theaters, and I'll buy the special edition Blu Ray when it comes out, and I'll immediately watch it again. I give The Amazing Spider-Man 2 a 7.5 out of 10. Go see it, and come back again later for another Something Awesome.
Great review.
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