Anthony Stokes shares his concerns over the future of Sony's Amazing Spider-Man franchise...
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Jim Carrey has been rumored to have a role in The Amazing Spider-Man 2. Now I've made it very public that I'm a huge fan of Sam Raimi and his Spider-Man trilogy. Behind Toy Story it is probably my favorite trilogy of all time, so when Sony announced a reboot I was pretty upset. It's not as if there was any motive other than business, and Sony flat out made The Amazing Spider-Man for no other reason than to make money. But I didn't get on message boards typing profusely " I WILL NOT ALLOW THIS"; instead, I just didn't see it when it came out in theaters. The trailers made it look like a melting pot of every other superhero movie out there. It seemed to have no identity or style. But when it came out people liked it - some even more than Sam Raimi's Spider-Man. So I waited until it came out on VOD and watched it. Needless to say I was not disappointed. Primarily because I had low expectations.
Now to be fair there were somethings I liked about the reboot. Very small things. Minuscule tiny things. There was a really touching moment where Flash Thompson allowed Peter to take out his frustrations on him after grieving the loss of his uncle Ben. It was really sweet and it elicited a genuine moment of emotion from me. I also liked every single bit of casting in the movie. A great selection of actors. I particularly liked Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy. And the end credits were fantastic - not the stinger, but the end credits. That's all I got.
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Now The Amazing Spider-Man isn't a bad movie. It's average. It should be called "The Okay Spider-Man" . Even the special effects, which should by all means look better than Raimi’s films, look like - for lack of a better word special - effects. That's one thing that should be indisputable seeing as Spider-Man came out 11 years ago. It's called film by committee. A bunch of guys who are only concerned about mass appeal sat down and added every element in to make sure it made money at the box office. Peter Parker has Edward hair; lateral changes were made to distinguish it from Sam Raimi's movies which literally serve no purpose to the story; The Lizard having a mouth line similar to The Joker's from The Dark Knight; the emphasis on romance; the awful stinger. You could write an article just from the elements that The Amazing Spider-Man borrows from other movies. And it worked. The Amazing Spider-Man made a lot of money, but what was the cost? It lost anything that could make it special. To be honest, I fail to see how it's much better then Green Lantern - another weak superhero movie with a mixed identity and confused intentions.
Even worse the movie tried hardest to be funny by having Peter Parker mouth off to criminals. Who were already detained. It felt really mean spirited and made Peter Parker seem like a jerk. But the worst had to be the scene where Peter and Gwen are making plans and start finishing each others sentences. This almost brought me to physical illness. Andrew Garfield is a great actor, and I don't blame him - he was just given bad lines to deliver. The Amazing Spider-Man contained one of my biggest pet peeves these days – getting great, Oscar-calibre or iconic actors and giving them generic roles to play that restrict their performance. If you're going to get somebody great, give them something to do or give them an interesting arc. You have this amazing cast, but none of them live up to their potential. It reminded me of Michael Shannon in Man of Steel. None of the performances in The Amazing Spider-Man are bad per se, but they're not up to the level that they could be given the talent and the mythos.
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Which is why this news of Jim Carrey being rumored for The Amazing Spider-Man 2 really frustrates me. Sony couldn't get one villain right with Rhys Ifans as the imitation Killer Croc, and in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 they're going to introduce Rhino (Paul Giamatti), Harry Osborn (Dane DeHaan), Norman Osborn (Chris Cooper), Electro (Jamie Foxx), and now allegedly Carnage. Granted this is just a rumor, and I'm not going to hold this against Sony too much, but that's still about three villains too many. Spider-Man 3 primarily suffered from studio interference and too many villains, but it seems Sony doesn’t look at past failures before proceeding to make more movies.
To me, the Comic-Con footage was the nail in the coffin for any hope I had left for this franchise. While not outright bad, it had all the ear notes of what I didn't like about the first one. Two great actors in Jamie Foxx and Paul Giamatti given two iconic roles and from the footage I've seen they're playing generic characters. Jamie Foxx is playing a nerd turned villain - Edward Nygma from Batman Forever - with no real presence. Paul Giamatti looks to be playing Rhino in a really bland and generic way with Spider-Man pulling down his pants for a cheap visual gag. These are two celebrated actors who could be replaced by anyone. It tried to be funny and failed. It even used a washing machine joke that was already used in the original trilogy, and Garfield had to fall back on the whole, “nothing I'm saying is funny so I'll have to say it incredibly fast and unconvincing between stutters to sell it”, a.k.a. the Vince Vaughn / Chris Tucker method. Anything good in the footage felt very familiar, and once again I can't fault anybody for being excited, but it just didn't get me excited like a trailer is supposed to do.
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It's obvious Sony is setting up the Sinister Six story over three movies. I say Sony, because Webb seems to be in the passenger seat and Sony wants to use one of the more popular Spider-Man runs. I guess if done right it could be epic through sheer strength in numbers, but from where I'm sitting it's just another cash grab. And I'm only this cynical because it's so obvious that Sony's only doing this for for monetary gain. Notice how a movie is coming out every two years, and they've already announced sequels up to the fourth installment? It reeks of desperation and greed. It's trying so hard to be relevant. Instead of seeping out information to keep fan excited, it's jumping up and down trying to get people's attention. I hope I'm wrong and that The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is the best Spider-Man movie ever made. Nothing would make me happier, but as of right now I'm really wishing Spider-Man was back at Marvel.
Anthony Stokes is a blogger and independent filmmaker.
Now to be fair there were somethings I liked about the reboot. Very small things. Minuscule tiny things. There was a really touching moment where Flash Thompson allowed Peter to take out his frustrations on him after grieving the loss of his uncle Ben. It was really sweet and it elicited a genuine moment of emotion from me. I also liked every single bit of casting in the movie. A great selection of actors. I particularly liked Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy. And the end credits were fantastic - not the stinger, but the end credits. That's all I got.
Even worse the movie tried hardest to be funny by having Peter Parker mouth off to criminals. Who were already detained. It felt really mean spirited and made Peter Parker seem like a jerk. But the worst had to be the scene where Peter and Gwen are making plans and start finishing each others sentences. This almost brought me to physical illness. Andrew Garfield is a great actor, and I don't blame him - he was just given bad lines to deliver. The Amazing Spider-Man contained one of my biggest pet peeves these days – getting great, Oscar-calibre or iconic actors and giving them generic roles to play that restrict their performance. If you're going to get somebody great, give them something to do or give them an interesting arc. You have this amazing cast, but none of them live up to their potential. It reminded me of Michael Shannon in Man of Steel. None of the performances in The Amazing Spider-Man are bad per se, but they're not up to the level that they could be given the talent and the mythos.
To me, the Comic-Con footage was the nail in the coffin for any hope I had left for this franchise. While not outright bad, it had all the ear notes of what I didn't like about the first one. Two great actors in Jamie Foxx and Paul Giamatti given two iconic roles and from the footage I've seen they're playing generic characters. Jamie Foxx is playing a nerd turned villain - Edward Nygma from Batman Forever - with no real presence. Paul Giamatti looks to be playing Rhino in a really bland and generic way with Spider-Man pulling down his pants for a cheap visual gag. These are two celebrated actors who could be replaced by anyone. It tried to be funny and failed. It even used a washing machine joke that was already used in the original trilogy, and Garfield had to fall back on the whole, “nothing I'm saying is funny so I'll have to say it incredibly fast and unconvincing between stutters to sell it”, a.k.a. the Vince Vaughn / Chris Tucker method. Anything good in the footage felt very familiar, and once again I can't fault anybody for being excited, but it just didn't get me excited like a trailer is supposed to do.
I love it when a big event film is released with a few glaring, fixable issues and the director comes out and says, "noted, we'll fix that" - Joss Whedon on The Avengers for example. While The Amazing Spider-Man failed to reach the heights of Raimi’s trilogy, it didn't really get a significant amount of criticism either, so more than likely it will be more of the same. And hey, some people like it, so I'm not going to take that away from them. I just won't go out of my way to see it. Which is sad, as I love Spider-Man and want to enjoy his movies, but I'm not going to be the guy who shows up to a movie just to be disappointed and complain.
It's obvious Sony is setting up the Sinister Six story over three movies. I say Sony, because Webb seems to be in the passenger seat and Sony wants to use one of the more popular Spider-Man runs. I guess if done right it could be epic through sheer strength in numbers, but from where I'm sitting it's just another cash grab. And I'm only this cynical because it's so obvious that Sony's only doing this for for monetary gain. Notice how a movie is coming out every two years, and they've already announced sequels up to the fourth installment? It reeks of desperation and greed. It's trying so hard to be relevant. Instead of seeping out information to keep fan excited, it's jumping up and down trying to get people's attention. I hope I'm wrong and that The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is the best Spider-Man movie ever made. Nothing would make me happier, but as of right now I'm really wishing Spider-Man was back at Marvel.
Anthony Stokes is a blogger and independent filmmaker.