Escape to the Movies: The Amazing Spider-Man

[Siege_TF]

Gwen Stacy wasn't 'Gwen Stacy', she was a lab assistant named Gwen Stacy who, again, didn't have the decency to die like a good Gwen Stacy should. This is the Aeris Gainsbourogh of the Spidey series and she's survived two unassoicated movies. That's wrong. They could have at least made her a literal corperate whore like in Antitrust, but that'd make her interesting. God forbid.

To be honest, there's a lot in that post I could pick apart, but I would like to address just one particular thing:

THIS IS THE FIRST MOVIE WITH SEQUELS ALREADY PLANNED!

Asking them to kill Gwen this early would be completely pointless. And no, the fact that she survived SM3 has no relevancy here because this is an entirely different continuity with its own character arcs to deal with. Save her death for a story arc where it will actually have impact. Remember Rachael in The Dark Knight?

The fact that she survived SM3 has everything to do with her surviving AMS because it's Gwen Stacy. That's two movies that they've botched the one thing that she's supposed to do. It's not even a hard thing, easy as falling off a log (or a bridge). She is supposed to die to hammer home that even though he accepted the whole power - responcibility thing he still can't save the day all the time. But he does. But he's not supposed to. Because I'm Batman. I mean because he's Spider Man.

 

[stiver]

Opinions are subjective ideas people can have, yet this guy has reached into the fabric of the universe and bent it to the point where he created a singularity and has spoken an opinion that is completely and totally wrong.

Unlike the past movies, which people spend too much time fellating, The Amazing Spider-Man is the most faithful and best adaptation there is. It is disrespectful for people to keep calling themselves Spider-man fans and then go on to say they didn't like a character that so closely represents the actual comics.

 

[ChildofGallifrey]

The unnecessarily scathing review would hold a lot more weight if Bob hadn't publicly decided that he hated the movie more than a year ago (even complaining about Andy Garfield's hair). I generally agree with Bob, but this was as far from an objective review as I've ever seen him give.

EDIT: Just came back from seeing the movie. It was good. All Bob's subjective gripes are his to have, but objectively it was well paced, had a decent script, was well acted and had some entertaining action scenes. Andy Garfield, in particular, played his character infinitely closer to the comic version than Tobey Maguire did (he really had the wit down, where Maguire hardly had any of that).

It's not going to win anything outside of an MTV Movie Award, but almost as bad as Green Lantern? Not even in the same galaxy.

 

[BaronIveagh]

Sadly, the attempt at world-building is also doomed, as Peters original birth parents were killed by The Red Skull (last I checked, unless this has been retconned).

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

Just saw it last night and let me say, there's a very good reason why this movie has been getting good reviews everywhere else, and it isn't because the world has gone mad like Bob would like to believe.

Even so, this is what I say: Bob told you to not see this film because he doesn't want it to make any money. But you also can't trust me to tell you it's good. Don't listen to me, the critics, or Bob when we tell you how awesome or shitty this movie is.

See it for yourself. Make your own judgement on whether it was worth it or not.

This is not a movie you can judge easily without actually seeing it. This isn't Transformers or Battleship or Sucker Punch where you can look at the trailer and just know it's going to be shitty without even watching it.

 

[Andronicus]

I just saw it then with some friends. Not exactly my first (or second, or third, or fourth, or...) choice, but I really only went because I haven't seen my uni friends all holidays so far, and this is what they chose to see. Anyway, yeah, it's pretty bad. The whole thing looked visually pretty cheap, and the Lizard did look Spidey's poor obnoxious one-liners were extremely painful to endure, but the worst part was the awkward period of muttering between Gwen and Peter when trying to ask her out on a date. One of the weirdest, idiotic things I've ever seen in a movie.

Also, honourable mention goes to spidey crawling out of a sewer, covered in blood and poo, and into Gwen's room, whereupon she immediately smothers him in kisses. What. The. Fuck.

 

[ninjaRiv]

You know what? I don't care. This films looks shitty but nowhere near as bad as Raimi's films. yeah, that's right I can't stand those terrible "films."

Sorry, just had to say that.

 

[ninjaRiv]

The unnecessarily scathing review would hold a lot more weight if Bob hadn't publicly decided that he hated the movie more than a year ago (even complaining about Andy Garfield's hair). I generally agree with Bob, but this was as far from an objective review as I've ever seen him give.

I have to agree. As much as I love Bob(I do love him... to the point where it's creepy!) I got a bit sick of his Twitter feed condemning the film before it came out. And before a trailer was released.

 

[TheDrunkNinja]

Also, just so we're clear... I go to an IT school filled with nerds, geeks, programmers, the works. Smart guys with glasses that would serve as the stereotypical nerd that Bob wants to be protagonists so badly.

You walk around campus... You see half of them skateboarding to class. They dress like Peter Parker did. A lot of them can be serious slackers.

These people exist, Bob. They're real. More real than your narrow perception of what nerds are "supposed to be", and I'm glad they updated it instead of resorting to a decades-old stereotype that we've seen so many fucking times and has already been done in a Spider-man film.

And in that, we only got the barest of bones when it came to Toby Maguire's Peter Parker being a "scientist".

People, in this film, Peter Parker rides a skateboard, but he's also a scientist. He's a scientist first. He uses his smarts and knowledge as much as his spider skills. He builds things, he designs things, he figures out equations and formulas. You never got that in Sam Rami's films, and that's a huge character trait to leave out.

The Peter Parker in this film feels like someone I would know in real life, especially where I work.

 

[faeshadow]

This is such a shame. I wanted this to work out for Andrew Garfield. He's a good actor. :-/

 

[Raesvelg]

Yet I don't think that is the case. Hell he probably went into it thinking it would be bad and it met or exceeded those expectations (in the worst way imaginable it seems). He probably went into it knowing more than the average viewer, since it is his job, but I cannot say he went into it not giving it a chance. That is your opinion.

Indeed, it is[ my opinion, but it's an opinion that's been supported by pretty much everything Bob has said about this film from the day it was announced. He's always hated it, in part because, well, he's clearly a bit of a Raimi fanboy.

Personally, I felt that the first Raimi Spider-Man movie was... okay. Not great overall, a little heavy on some of Raimi's signature moves, and incredibly poorly cast. The second one was a bit better, but the third was bad enough that it should have killed the franchise outright.

So yes, I will assert that Bob's review of this film is, essentially, unfair and biased from the start. Ordinarily Bob and I line up on our opinions, oh, around 60-70% of the time. I've not seen this film, but I'm also not going to use Bob's review as a factor in whether or not I will.

And yes, reviewing is an inherently subjective process, but again, there's a distinct difference between subjective and prejudiced. Professionally speaking, his duty is to put personal feelings aside to as great an extent as possible and review a film on its merits, not how he feels about its existence.

 

[MrBrightside919]

To say I saw that coming a mile away would be an understatement...

After Spiderman 3, I don't have much faith in future Spidey movies...unless Marvel gets the rights back, which will never happen unfortunately...

*Crosses fingers for this movie to bomb hard*

Sorry to dash your dreams( and mine) this movie is no. 1 right now in other countries including here in the Philippines.

Guess i'm not crossing them hard enough...

 

[Existentialistme]

Yesh, I haven't seen you rage that much since the Green Lantern review. From the sound of it, it seen this year isn't good for Spider-man per say (well I don't know what going with him in the comic but I do know that Ultimate Spider-man is aweful).

Either way it look like my question had been answer to wheather to watch this or Prometheus if I'm going to the cinema any time soon before The Dark Knight Rises.

How do you justify that Ultimate Spider-Man is awful? You can argue that you don't like it, that's fine, but I would hardly call it awful.

 

[Daria.Morgendorffer]

The amount of people who blindly accepts MovieBob´s opinion as fact truly astonishes me ("Bob didnt like it. I wont see it"). I ´m also amazed to read stuff like "I´m glad this movie will fail", even without watching the film. The review seems fueled by fanrage and i can tell that Bob went into the theatre without an open mind. Since the reviews are all over the place, i´ll give it a shot and find out for myself if it´s good or not.

This doesn't surprise me. There was a lot of it in the opposite direction for The Avengers (Bob knew he would like it and reviewed it as much), and the fandom rejoiced...and gloated accordingly.

As for my opinion, no, a reboot wasn't necessary, but it isn't the end of the world. I just use reviews to see if it's worth the effort to go see a movie in the theater (I'm a grownup now, I really do have to wonder if three hours is worth spending on a movie).

But I'm inclined to believe that this movie isn't the worst thing ever, just the way I believed The Avengers wasn't the best thing ever going in (turned out I was right, but anyway...cheap dig over)

 

[Scarim Coral]

Yesh, I haven't seen you rage that much since the Green Lantern review. From the sound of it, it seen this year isn't good for Spider-man per say (well I don't know what going with him in the comic but I do know that Ultimate Spider-man is aweful).

Either way it look like my question had been answer to wheather to watch this or Prometheus if I'm going to the cinema any time soon before The Dark Knight Rises.

How do you justify that Ultimate Spider-Man is awful? You can argue that you don't like it, that's fine, but I would hardly call it awful.

I can assure you that I'm not the only one who had been hating the Ultimate Spider-man cartoon.
While I can assume comments made from places like Youtube or Comicvine ain't legit but would this prove enough that there are people disliking the Ultimate Spider-man?-
http://www.bleedingcool.com/2012/06/19/the-boy-who-hated-ultimate-spider-man/

EDIT- Oh how about this? http://www.thecriticalfailure.com/tag/ultimate-spider-man/

 

[Existentialistme]

I can assure you that I'm not the only one who had been hating the Ultimate Spider-man cartoon.
While I can assume comments made from places like Youtube or Comicvine ain't legit but would this prove enough that there are people disliking the Ultimate Spider-man?-
http://www.bleedingcool.com/2012/06/19/the-boy-who-hated-ultimate-spider-man/

Okay, the cartoon sure, but did you read the actual books? I thought they were very good for the most part. A couple of bad choices here and there, but the beginning of them and the retelling of the origin story was great. Like, I'll probably get a lot of hate for this, but at the start of the original Amazing Spider-Man, all the characters seemed kind of dull and not fully formed. It took a LONG time for the series to come into itself. Sure, it was immensely likable from the start, but not necessarily 'good.' I'll go back and read it now and realize how dated it is, and frankly, to me the early stuff is just kind of silly and boring. Spider-Man has always and will always be my favorite super hero and I feel the Ultimate Spider-Man run captured why we all love him quite well, while still delivering a more modernized take on him that's a bit easier to swallow now a days.

 

[PhunkyPhazon]

The fact that she survived SM3 has everything to do with her surviving AMS because it's Gwen Stacy. That's two movies that they've botched the one thing that she's supposed to do. It's not even a hard thing, easy as falling off a log (or a bridge). She is supposed to die to hammer home that even though he accepted the whole power - responcibility thing he still can't save the day all the time. But he does. But he's not supposed to. Because I'm Batman. I mean because he's Spider Man.

Have some patience with this, seriously. Yes, Gwen Stacy should probably die, even Emma Stone agrees on this. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QaEAFb0oiY8] But that doesn't mean she has to die the exact instant she appears onscreen! It's not like they introduced her in the comics only to kill her off the very next issue, she lasted over 80 issues! In Ultimate, she lasted 40 (Although she was eventually brought back, but whatever), in the Spectacular cartoon she lasted the entire run, and may have eventually kicked the bucket had it continued.

This movie is already filled with enough death to traumatize Peter, how impactful would Gwen's have been on top of everything else? Save it for a future movie, let the audience truly grow used to her and like her. before stuffing her in the fridge.

Yesh, I haven't seen you rage that much since the Green Lantern review. From the sound of it, it seen this year isn't good for Spider-man per say (well I don't know what going with him in the comic but I do know that Ultimate Spider-man is aweful).

Either way it look like my question had been answer to wheather to watch this or Prometheus if I'm going to the cinema any time soon before The Dark Knight Rises.

How do you justify that Ultimate Spider-Man is awful? You can argue that you don't like it, that's fine, but I would hardly call it awful.

Because it's really Ultimate Deadpool? Because most of the jokes don't work? Because the supporting cast is really annoying and unlikeable? Because the villains are all C-listers from different Marvel franchises? I'm not saying you can't like it, but there's a lot of things wrong with this show.

 

[Scarim Coral]

I can assure you that I'm not the only one who had been hating the Ultimate Spider-man cartoon.
While I can assume comments made from places like Youtube or Comicvine ain't legit but would this prove enough that there are people disliking the Ultimate Spider-man?-
http://www.bleedingcool.com/2012/06/19/the-boy-who-hated-ultimate-spider-man/

Okay, the cartoon sure, but did you read the actual books? I thought they were very good for the most part. A couple of bad choices here and there, but the beginning of them and the retelling of the origin story was great. Like, I'll probably get a lot of hate for this, but at the start of the original Amazing Spider-Man, all the characters seemed kind of dull and not fully formed. It took a LONG time for the series to come into itself. Sure, it was immensely likable from the start, but not necessarily 'good.' I'll go back and read it now and realize how dated it is, and frankly, to me the early stuff is just kind of silly and boring. Spider-Man has always and will always be my favorite super hero and I feel the Ultimate Spider-Man run captured why we all love him quite well, while still delivering a more modernized take on him that's a bit easier to swallow now a days.

I don't but I know enough how different Ultimate Spider-man is when comparing to the comicbook (yes I know Peter is a joker at times and for one thing how the hell do you get Venom just by tampering Peter blood? Even then without going from the comicbook outer space route, I know that in the Ultimate Spider-man comicbook the symbiote was like an organic suit to cure cancer or something like that).
I just dislike it so I'm keeping it to myself (mostly). I mean if you like it then go ahead, I won't bother you unlike some people (I ain't no hater/ troll, I hate the show therefore I stop watching it as simple as that).

 

[Ramzal]

...How do you make a Spider man movie with out J. Jonah Jameson?

And this is why I would be disinclined to see this movie, Jameson is my favourite character from any Spiderman series, comics cartoon or otherwise, without him, the world of spiderman may as well cease to exist.

Also, teen romance crap? Seriously? Pass.

Okay. I've had enough of this. As I said, I've been reading Spider-man comics for 20 years and let me just say that J. Jonah Jameson is the WORST character in the series. Seriously, he is one dimension to a point where he is just plain predictable to a point of annoyance. He does -everything- in his power to screw over anyone actually trying to help and never does a single thing actually meaningful or useful with himself.

Do you know why J.J hates Spider-man? Because he is jealous of him. Seriously, anyone who's picked up a Spider-man comic would know this. In the early part of The Amazing Spider-man, J.J admits right out that the reason he hates Spider-man isn't because he has a mask on, it's the fact that he helps people and asks for nothing in return, and it makes him feel like less of a person because he's never accomplished anything of the sort or would never try to.

Even after Peter Parker revealed himself publicly, Peter call J.J out on it and he admitted he was right later. He is a petty, self centered, piece of one dimensional sad excuse for a character and it is hard to see why people even like him so much. Past that, you want to know why he sucks so badly in the original trilogy of Spider-man movies? His reasoning for disliking Spider-Man was never stated. He was just a hateful little jerk who couldn't grow up. They failed at even establishing why a character is the way he is just like they did with Peter, Mary Jane, and Gwen in those movies. (They pulled off Eddie Brock correctly though. That was a surprise.)

He's not even doing it to sell papers, he just wants to slander because he'll feel better about himself. When he had a heart attack in The Amazing Spider-Man comics, I was seriously hoping he would die. So they can bury that one horse lined character who all he amounts to is childish biterness and "IT'S ALL SPIDER-MAN'S FAULT!" With all truth, he is the Brian Griffin of Spider-man series. A one dimensional, self centered character that thinks he knows better, but in reality is just a one trick pony of a hack.