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User Reviews for: The Amazing Spider-Man

SkinnyFilmBuff
CONTAINS SPOILERS7/10  2 years ago
Part 4 (of 8) of my Spider-Man movie re-watch marathon in preparation for No Way Home. Once again, I'm not going to update my original score for this movie (7/10) based on this viewing.

**THE BAD:** At release, this film was criticized for being too rapid of a reboot, coming only five years after Tobey Maguire's last outing. Personally, I don't think that should be held against it, as it's kind of a meta criticism, but I will say, having just marathoned Sam Raimi's trilogy, I definitely understand where the criticism is coming from. I think the big issue is the origin story. While the movie tries to shake things up, all of the main ingredients are identical (Oscorp, spider bite, Uncle Ben, etc.). And unfortunately, some of the new elements don't exactly land. The overly ambitious attempt to tie Peter's parents to the plot through some larger conspiracy feels misguided at best. This is especially true nine years post, when we know that all of this ambitious world-building doesn't culminate in anything, having been scuttled due to the less than record breaking, and in fact diminishing box office returns of Amazing Spider-Man 1 & 2. While most of the intentional cheesiness of the Sam Raimi films has been jettisoned, there are still some eye-rolling scenes (e.g. the crane operators saving the day near the finale). The main villain is underwhelming, especially compared to Willem Dafoe's Green Goblin. Peter's whiplash change of heart at the end is pretty bad, going from [spoiler]"I promised your dead dad I would stay away from you to keep you safe" to "lol, jk" in less than 4 minutes[/spoiler].

**THE GOOD:** Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone are a nice change of pace over Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst. They both just seem to be having fun, which helps sell the characters and the moments of humor. On the character side, the Peter/Gwen relationship is much more palatable than the strange and messy Peter/MJ relationship we saw before. The quick reveal of Peter's secret identity also helps avoid treading the same boring ground. The non-organic web-shooters are appreciated, as are the creative uses incorporated into the action sequences. The web-swinging is top notch.
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