so I went ahead and rewatched ALL the Spider-Man movies in the past week, most of which I hadn't seen since theaters, and I'd never watched the Garfield ones at all. I'm glad I ended when I did rather than right before the new movie cuz I am BURNT OUT on Spider-MEN! I need a break
Takeaways:
- Spider-Man 3 is a mess plot-wise but it's actually an amazing comedy, MOST of it intentional. The dance scene gets shit on for no reason, the Evil Peter stuff was by far the best part of the movie. Tobey's pretty one-note "loser nerd" throughout these movies so getting him to play so far against type was fun af. And "Look at little Goblin Jr! Gonna CRY?" might be the best Spider-Man line of all-time, especially so after rewatching that trilogy in quick succession and realizing Harry was the absolute worst part of it
- Amazing Spider-Man 1 was eeeasily the worst of all these, idk why the 2nd one gets shit on more. The 2nd at least tried to have more FUN with it and didn't have super brooding/angsty Peter like this one. And the Uncle Ben death was laughably bad
- The contrast between the three iterations was p interesting, especially as far as the directorial imprint goes. You had the Raimi movies with a VERY distinct campy personality, then you had the weird indie movie vibe of the Webb ones, and then you had...Marvel. Like it's not new news that Marvel applies a very clear formula to their movies (with a few exceptions) but man, it's never been as obvious as watching it so close to the others. Obviously the Holland ones were better than the Garfield ones, but it was actually kinda sad to see the personality suddenly get sucked out like that, out of the director's hands and into The Formula™
I’ve been watching the movies to catch up too and it makes me realize I like the tone of the Garfield movies over Holland ones. Spider-Man should have some darkness to it.
somewhat agree? The personal tragedy is one thing that's definitely missing, although I get why they didn't want to rehash the Uncle Ben death yet again. Tony dying is the closest thing but not really the same since there's no personal responsibility attached to it
but speaking of Tony that'd probably be MY main complaint with the Holland ones, that they made him so closely intertwined with Stark. What's good/unique about the character is that he's self-made, an average high school nerd who stumbles into being a superhero. Being handed the keys to the kingdom like he has with all the advanced tech and shit makes him feel just as much like Iron Man Jr as he does Spider-Man
just got back from it. Prob have more to say about it later but for now I think I can safely say it's the best of the MCU Spidey movies. Still had a lot of the unshakeable Marvel misgivings but despite that it was a lot of fun and handled its premise better than I thought it would
also never in all my days have I heard an audience reaction like a couple points in this movie got. Pretty sure this guy behind me actually came during a certain moment, things got intense
just got back from it. Prob have more to say about it later but for now I think I can safely say it's the best of the MCU Spidey movies. Still had a lot of the unshakeable Marvel misgivings but despite that it was a lot of fun and handled its premise better than I thought it would
also never in all my days have I heard an audience reaction like a couple points in this movie got. Pretty sure this guy behind me actually came during a certain moment, things got intense
And you still gave it a lowly 6/10 on LB! Thought it’d be higher after reading this
Seeing it shortly
6/10 is a positive rating Curt! Above-average for MCU
first of all, even though I was MUCH more of a Doc Ock fan as a young lad, I gotta say Dafoe absolutely stole this movie. I feel like having heroes/villains shed their mask so we can see the actor's face is so overdone (Topher's Venom is prob the worst example of this) but in THIS case it was a great call, cuz Dafoe's facial expressions are way more menacing than the Power Rangers mask could ever be. Every time you heard that cackle as he flew onto screen was such a joy
The other villains got a little shortchanged in comparison but were all decent, with the exception of Sandman where it felt like Thomas Haden Church did not give a shit at all, his line readings were so stiff
I definitely was pleasantly surprised by what they did with the multiversal plot. The trailers had a lot of Strange's mirror dimension which made it feel like this movie was gonna be like an Endgame level extravaganza, but it really did stay focused on the core characters surprisingly well. Mostly was just a fun little adventure of Peter needing to clean up his mess rather than anything world-ending. Maybe started going a little too 'big' in the third act when there were now like a dozen characters to service but it was still balanced p well
Only character I felt got sadly shortchanged was Betty :( Angourie Rice was too fun in the previous movies/in general to be relegated to just one line. JJJ was honestly kind of a disappointment too, nowhere near as fun as his original appearances
It was really weird seeing Tobey as this wise old Peter but it fits the character pretty well. Wish they would've brought back the Elfman theme for him tho! Still not sure I understand why Andrew/Tobey were not de-aged when the villains were but...sure! I guess cuz they never died? But Lizard and Sandman didn't die either and they were still de-aged? It's w/e tho
Another thing I'll say is I feel like this movie FINALLY addressed one of my main annoyances with Holland's Spider-Man with him being Iron Man Jr. It took until the end but he not only is back to living in poverty (which...I feel like in this universe the Avengers would certainly just find out who he is again and recruit him back, but HOPEFULLY NOT) but he had some genuine tragedy and bittersweet decisions he had to make. The ending of this movie felt so much like the end of Tobey's Spider-Man 1. Definitely makes me excited to see the future of Holland's character which I never thought I'd say coming into this
I'm now realizing that I mostly have positive thoughts on this movie so maybe I AM underrating it a bit, idk. I still was annoyed by a lot of traditional MCU hallmarks (dialogue, unimaginative directing, etc) but I might as well just copy and paste that for 95% of MCU's movies, it's barely even worth mentioning at this point
just got back from it. Prob have more to say about it later but for now I think I can safely say it's the best of the MCU Spidey movies. Still had a lot of the unshakeable Marvel misgivings but despite that it was a lot of fun and handled its premise better than I thought it would
also never in all my days have I heard an audience reaction like a couple points in this movie got. Pretty sure this guy behind me actually came during a certain moment, things got intense
And you still gave it a lowly 6/10 on LB! Thought it’d be higher after reading this
Seeing it shortly
6/10 is a positive rating Curt! Above-average for MCU
I guess I remember you liking the second one kwuite a bit more
Biggest disappointment was somehow...the Garfield/Tobey entrance. I loved the two of them in the movie, but their actual entrance was so forgettable. Everyone knew they were coming ofc, and I thought the exact moment was gonna rival Cap lifting the hammer or everyone showing up through the portals behind Cap, but it was no where close imo. And it should've been! It could've been such a huge moment, like Holland Spidey after a brutal defeat fucking drowning or something and a second gloved Spidey hand reaches down and grabs onto his, idk man, something like that. My audience was like woohooo when they both showed up but not like LET'S FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO! like they should've been, you feel me?
I agree your version would've been better but we had veryyyy different theater experiences in that case lol. Those were some religious experiences for about half my crowd