This movie is just poorly written. They turned Peter Parker from likeable nerd to douchebag outsider. They played off a "relationship" with Gwen that was never established or believable at all. Every supporting character is one dimensional and used as a bad set piece. That includes Uncle Ben and Aunt May and THAT is a crime. Aunt May should be more than a dimwit asking for eggs. She's never used as Peter's moral compass and that is a KEY in any Spider-Man tale. Uncle Ben's death is handled poorly and the emotional impact is glossed over. Peter is depicted as more angry than guilty and that's adds no depth at all. He also orders the web cartridges through the mail and does nothing but develop the delivery system. WHAT? A few smart-ass douchey comments is also NOT good humor. There's also nothing that's memorable about any scene or fight in this movie. NOTHING. The Lizard not only looks terrible but is so cliched as a villain.
Overly praising this effort because you like the cast or have high hopes for the future doesn't do anyone any good if they think it's OK to write a script this bad for the sequel.
I think the great thing about TASM is that it brought a fresh interpretation that gave us a much deeper understanding of what makes Peter tick. It's a Spider-Man movie that understand that the story you tell in a 2 hour movie is different from the story you tell in a 50 year comic book series. There are some things you can get away with in a comic book that you can't get away with in a movie, and vice verse.
First of all, the idea of Peter being a likeable nerd prior to becoming Spider-Man. We don't actually
know much about what Peter was like before he became Spider-Man. Sure, Peter might have come across as excessively polite and spineless. But that's more a product of the era than the character itself. And there's a difference. It's the same thing that happens when you adapt "The Brady Bunch." If you try to do it accurate to the source material, you end up with a bunch of comically outdated characters who don't fit in at all with their surroundings, and then making fun of the source material becomes the joke in itself. That's what Joel Schumacher attempted for "Batman and Robin."
I never read the early Iron Man, but I'm guessing that the Tony Stark from the early 1960s was
very different from the Tony Stark in the movies. And that's okay. Because the Tony Stark we have today is exactly how we'd expect the character to act if he was born in the modern era. And I think that the same is true for TASM. Peter Parker might be a bit of a dick sometime, but he's a bullied outsider who lost both his parents at a very young age and still doesn't know
why. That's going to leave a big chip on his shoulder, and that's what you see in the movie.
I like the new Aunt May better, because it's actually plausible for her to be Peter's Aunt, where as the old Aunt May is old enough to be Peter's great-grandmother. Again, she's not the Aunt May you grew up with. But the Aunt May you grew up with was born in the early 1900s, before the Great Depression, and before the existence of TV and radio. She was a product of her era, and she does not make any sense in a modern context.
Also, you're upset that Peter is full of rage and anger after Uncle Ben dies? I'm sorry, but that reaction seems completely believable to me,
especially for a teenager who already lost both his parents. Even
Flash Thompson understood that Peter was angry.
You're expecting a teenaged boy to accept his Uncle's death and vow to become a superhero overnight. That simply doesn't happen. The only reason it happened that way in the comic books is because "Amazing Fantasy #15" was written as a one-shot. They didn't know if they would get to write future issues until after it was published, and so they did everything to wrap the story up as neatly as possible. In a movie, you get the chance to actually explore what Peter is going through.
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DUKEJBM
11 years ago
ASM brought not much fresh at all. The only fresh stuff took the character backwards or in the wrong direction. That is the complete opposite of progress.
Aunt May and even Ben were completely wasted as characters. WASTED.
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