I can’t believe I re-watched this. I was really disappointed by it the first time I saw it, and I’m still disappointed. But I’m not as actively angry. I’m more confused as to how they could make all the bad choices they did.
First thing first. They destroyed Peter Parker. I’ve never been too attached to the idea that Peter would be an outright nerd, because the comics usually didn’t hold onto that too long. In the Ultimate universe, they held onto it for about half a second, since he was in a nerdy relationship with Mary Jane in the first issue. In the original run of Amazing Spider-Man, he starts off outcast, and they very gradually make him into a liked person. He still has awkward interactions, but it’s clear that his classmates want to like him.
The problem with how they handled Peter here is that he’s far too cool. He skateboards. He’s not rejected by his peers. Gwen Stacy obviously likes him. The extent of him being outcast is that Flash Thompson picks on him. But Flash also seems to pick on everyone.
The second problem. The music is a serious annoyance. Some of the score is actually pretty good, and fairly inventive. But there are rock songs tacked on periodically, and this makes the movie feel dated. Spider-Man is a timeless character, and deserves timeless treatment.
The third problem: Peter Parker never learns a lesson.
In the original version of the Spider-Man origin, he refuses to make the effort to stop the burglar, who goes on to kill Uncle Ben. He’s not betrayed by the promoter, he isn’t doing this to get back at anyone. He’s just an arrogant, self-absorbed teen.
With this origin, it’s almost like a more extreme version of the variation on the origin that was done in the 2002 Spider-Man movie. The difference is that Peter’s reluctance to act is entirely justified. The person he would be helping is a jerk. The jerk quality of the clerk in this one is just absurd. It’s over-the-top, and that makes it seem even more like Peter is being a reasonable person.
I have one other problem that bugs me, but it’s not as important. In the comics, Captain Stacy came to like Peter, and as he was dying, he tells Spider-Man that he knows he’s Peter. There’s no explanation of how he knows this. But that’s part of the beauty of it. He understood Peter’s motivation, and knew that he was a good person. Class act, and it gave Captain Stacy a good note to go out on. Here, Captain Stacy unmasks Spider-Man and is only willing to let him go because Gwen is in danger. Turns him into a selfishly-motivated annoyance.
I still hate the product-pushing that the movie does. I find the crane operator stuff completely dumb.
But much more than the first time, I found the movie boring. A real shame.
This time through, I also noticed how little time they devote to the webbing issue. I’m really disappointed with this. I didn’t mind either previous versions. Organic web shooters is fine. Mechanical web shooters are fine too. In this case, they went with mechanical ones. But Peter uses an off-the-shelf product from Oscorp. This is bad, not just because it eliminates Peter’s genius, but it turns the webbing into something that’s not as destructible as the original webbing. Spider-Man’s webbing is supposed to dissolve in about an hour. This is a big deal, when you see him webbing up bad guys, and covering their mouths with the stuff.
The problem may not have been a script issue. It may have been meddling producers.
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