Escape to the Movies: The Amazing Spider-Man

Waaghpowa

Needs more Dakka
Apr 13, 2010
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Unlike most of you automatically siding with Bob, I've actually seen the film.

IT'S NOT BAD

And I'm the kind of person who thinks everything is crap. I found it to be funny and much closer to what I understand about spiderman from the comics than the other movies. Aside from the whole thing with Conners, I would say it's worth the watch.
 

Static Jak

New member
Mar 15, 2011
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Eh, reviews have been mixed going from ok to great but this is the first full on negative review I've seen.
And nearly every review I've watched or read has put Andrew as the better version of Peter Parker over Tobi, which aint that hard tbh.

All the same, I'd rather Spidey was back in Disney/Marvel hands simply to have him in the Avengers universe.
 

Li Mu

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Oct 17, 2011
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I never really enjoyed the Rami films, but watched them all the same (I was working at a cinema at the time, so saw them for free). The highlights of those films were the cameos of Bruce Campbell. As this doesn't have a Bruce Campbell cameo there is even less reason for me to see it.
 

Dastardly

Imaginary Friend
Apr 19, 2010
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MovieBob said:
The Amazing Spider-Man

MovieBob comes to you with a very special Tuesday episode to find out just how amazing is The Amazing Spider-Man.

Watch Video
While I typically agree with you, you're apparently waaaay too close to this material. It's not that the flaws you've pointed out are all untrue, it's just that they're not nearly as big as you've made them.

The parent storyline? Yeah, I'm with you on that. Taking the established characters and linking them all together does stink of too much coincidence... in hindsight. That's the thing. If you know these characters already, yes, it seems forced to connect them all. If you're not intimately familiar (More on this later), the only one that stands out is that Spidey's girlfriend is the daughter of Spidey's major detractor... but that's no different that Jameson being Spidey's #1 hate-fan and his boss, really.

A fundamental changing of Spider-Man's motivation? Eh, I thought I'd see it, but I don't. To me, he's still portrayed as the "Everyman Accidental Hero" here, and Uncle Ben still plays a major part in that. In fact:

This version actually stung me a little bit more, because Peter let the crook go not over a large sum of money, but over two pennies and some milk. He let his own hurt pride get the better of him over something so ridiculously trivial, and that got his uncle killed. If anything drives home the consequences-and-responsibility idea, it's that: Even a trivial slip-up can have disastrous consequences.

And as to "Who is Peter Parker?" this movie created a more authentic Parker than I've seen yet. Not all geeks are the same kind of geek. Not all smart kids are the antithesis of slackers. He had dimension, in that he had the kind of conflicting identity and motivations that real high school kids have. (I work with high school kids every day, and this one felt like a high school kid, particularly one with Peter's home situation)

THE BIG THING:

They can't continue to tell these stories to the original audience. They can't continue to pay the ever-increasing tribute to the "core fans." Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, these are characters that, to a degree, have outlived their audiences. What other medium does this but comics? (And, to a lesser-but-analogous degree, James Bond movies. Much-needed reboot, because the social climate is very different from when the first movies were made.)

Trying to keep the same character alive and fresh and interesting, and staying roughly the same age, and yet still appeasing to the "loyal fans," is the entire reason comics develop the twisted, knotted continuity and insane escalation that you've so often decried in your COMICS ARE WEIRD pieces on The Big Picture. Stories need endings to keep from getting this outlandish, and it's not always wrong to re-tell them a little differently after that ending.

With a lot of these reboots, there is a recognition that the characters are outliving their original audience (or at least their attention span). They're maintaining connections to the original, in hopes of bringing some of the old fans forward, but they're mostly trying to bring in new fans.

The problem when some folks get a little too "invested" in a particular version of a character, dating back even to childhood, is that those people begin to feel like investors. That is to say, they feel they're entitled to a particular return on that investment. And when it doesn't pay off that way, they get angry.

Batman. The whole DC universe. The heroes of the Avengers. Spider-Man. James Bond. They've all recently gotten reboots. And is there a huge financial motivation? Sure there is! You've got at least a somewhat guaranteed audience over trying to create an entirely new character. But also, there is a love that audiences and writers have over the core concepts of these characters... but not always over the insane continuity stretching behind them, or some of the archaic stylistic elements.

I feel that, in the majority of these reboots, that core concept has been retained and perhaps refined a bit. Some details are changed to avoid a super-strict retelling, and some characters are recycled for familiarity reasons, but the character is preserved. This movie is no exception: this felt more like a Spider-Man movie to me than any of the Sam Raimi projects (which, don't get me wrong, I still enjoyed).
 

Danzavare

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Oct 17, 2010
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Thank you. I don't think I've ever wanted to hear a movie torn apart like I've wanted this one to be (and sadly, Rotten Tomatoes wasn't up to the task). I'm not going to even try to pretend I don't have a personal grudge against the film. I'm not going to watch it in cinemas and I certainly don't think I could enjoy it. Thank you very much for this review Bob, I was hoping you'd be the critic to give this movie the backhand it deserves.
 

anian

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Sep 10, 2008
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As bad as it might be and I'm not saying anything because I haven't watched it, but I really have no expectations, at least it doesn't have Spiderman not being able to shoot webs because he's depressed, I mean if there's half a movie here where Peter acts emo, first Spideman trilogy had an hour in each of the movies.
Also it doesn't have the female lead (and come to think if it Peter was like that as well) look like she's a sick junkie they found on a street instead of a really cute actress.
And let us not forget the part of the 3rd movie where Tobey really looks emo only that's supposed to make him look cool and be a dick to the love of his life...
And as bad as CGI might be at least Spiderman doesn't seem to be made of rubber and lacking a spine.

All of that makes me think I'll watch this on tv some time from now and think "At least it's not the Raimi Spiderman."
You'd think they learned a lesson or two from the Avengers serial (let's face it Spiderman is more of an Avenger character than a Batman styled) and made a movie which would be cool to comic readers but also be a fun action movie for others, especially when they're apparently doing this to keep the brand.
 

Sovereignty

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Jan 25, 2010
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I kind of knew you were against this movie from it's inception, and because I liked spidey so much when I got a chance to see it early I did.

Even though you were probably a tiny bit biased about the movie, it is nearly as bad as you made it out to be. And that is a damn shame. I seriously felt like I was watching a teenage movie on Nickelodeon rather than an actual movie.
 

Elamdri

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Nov 19, 2009
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MovieBob said:
The Amazing Spider-Man

MovieBob comes to you with a very special Tuesday episode to find out just how amazing is The Amazing Spider-Man.

Watch Video
Holy Crap Bob! I don't think I've seen you dump on a movie like that in a LONG time.
 

WanderingFool

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Apr 9, 2009
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My thoughts leading up to this:

"OH HEY! MovieBob released a Escape to the movies on a Tuesday, and its about spiderman. Either it kicks all amounts of ass, or it sucks all amounts of ass."

Looks like it was the latter. Well, I wasnt planning on seeing this movie, so no loss on my part.
 

Chris Mosher

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Nov 28, 2011
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Never really felt this way about one of your reviews, but what movie did you watch?

Spoilers

Now I admit that I had no expectations going into this and that added to my enjoyment but I just don;t understand why people are ripping into this movie. Also I have to admit I did not like the first movie that much because the transition from teen kid to Superduper hero happened to fast and the Green Goblin was a wasted villain. Peter actually has to learn from his mistakes. Captain Stacey conversation with Peter actually leads to character development. Also, no one says " with great power comes great responsibility", instead Peter learns this from reflecting upon the reactions of other people.

I enjoyed the action as well. CGI is not 100% but I have seen worse and I will over look to see spiderman fight like spiderman and not like a stiff Tobey Macguire. The final fight with Green Goblin was so anti climatic it always left a bad taste with me even re watching it later on. This time around it felt like things had time to escalate between the Lizard

As for how Andrew Garfield and the way Peter acts, its like I reacted to long series deaths in my teen years (one was my father). Peter reacted erratically because that's is what kids do when deal with bad shit when they are kids.
 

Sejborg

New member
Jun 7, 2010
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Short version of this review:

Waaaah! I want Spiderman to join the Avengers and now he can't!

hehe
 

The Hungry Samurai

Hungry for Truth
Apr 1, 2004
453
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I like the idea that others are stating. Stop watching Spidey till he's back in Marvels hands. Even if bobs review may be harsh, I'd much rather hope to see him in the Avengers movie continuity.
 

shadowmagus

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Feb 2, 2011
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draythefingerless said:
Seems to me all the complaints have been based on your conceptions of classical spider man. i did not see any complaints on the movie as a movie itself apart from CGI and the lizard character. you go thru saying peter parker is emo, skater, slacker. you would have prefered a single stereotyped character? it seems to me he is more of a normal person, more grounded on reality. a real person =/= stereotype.
I think the problem isn't with stereotypes, its the fact that Peter Parker has NEVER been an emo/skater/slacket. He has always been a geek, a science nerd. To gloss over that part of his persona (which they don't even commit to because he eventually builds the web throwers), is a huge change from who Peter Parker has always been. It reeks of trying to pull in the teenager summer goers by trying to create a "hip" Spiderman. A change is fine. Completely rewritting the character traits that make Peter Parker who he is? Overboard.
 

The Last Nomad

Lost in Ethiopia
Oct 28, 2009
1,426
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I know I wouldn't like this film, but at least there is someone who hates it more than I do.
I just ignore it save for watching this review and possibly watching it if its on TV and I don't have the others on DVD (or literally anything else) so maybe I would hate it as much as bob if I was forced to watch it.

HOWEVER, the only saving graces for this film (in my mind) were Dennis Leary and the 3D, neither of which bob mentioned. Spider-man is exactly what 3D was made for and Dennis Leary is fucking awesome. But even these 2 things aren't enough to make me wanna see this film after that review
 

BrunDeign

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Feb 14, 2008
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As soon as I saw that Bob had gone through the trouble to make an early episode of this, I knew it either had to be unbelievably awesome or gut-wrenchingly bad. I was already leaning towards the latter, and I was right. Yay?

Also when Bob shrinks down the planet at one point in the video, it fits perfectly inside the play button that appears when you pause it. I just thought that was funny.
 

Smertnik

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Apr 5, 2010
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I expected this kind of reaction. I'm not really a hardcore Spiderman fan, so I'm not that butthurt about changes from the original material like you. I bet the movie is actually at the very least halfway decent.
But if there's one thing keeping me from watching this movie, it's the Lizard. Connor was probably my favourite character in the animated series, which I grew up with (and, coincidentally, the only Spiderman-related thing I ever experienced, apart from Sam Raimi's stuff), and from the trailers alone I can tell that he pretty much got ruined.
 

RJ Dalton

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Aug 13, 2009
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This is my "I'm totally not surprised by this" face. -____-
I've been expecting this since I heard about Raimi being booted. The other Spider-Man films weren't perfect, but at least Raimi loved Spider-Man and that translated onto the screen. The way he was removed from the project told me everything I needed to know about where this movie was going.