Escape to the Movies: The Amazing Spider-Man

itsthesheppy

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I love seeing people ride to the defense of a film that was made purely to milk them of dollars, as if they were moneycows. As if you kicked over their milk machine and they're like HEY. THE FARMER PAID GOOD MONEY FOR THAT.

Only the analogy maybe falls apart, because it's possible that the farmer actually has a little affection for the cows.
 

Cosplay Horatio

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J. Jonah Jameson isn't in this movie?!!! *FLIPS TABLE*

This review has given me the option to never see this film but unfortunately my current circumstances in which my wife and I are staying at her sisters place to take care of our nieces and nephew because she recently had her third kid but that also meant my getting a never ending earful of, UNCLE I WANNA SEE SPIDER MAN!, so we have to see it tomorrow.
 

Kyrian007

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Dastardly said:
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.

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).
While I agree with some of this, I do have one thing to point out. It's very understandable that a reboot needs to speak to a new (and usually younger and potentially larger) fanbase; the problem I have is...

Why can't a production team just take their screenplay and make it a new IP? Why take the "new direction" and attach it to a previously played out setting and characters?

I get that they want the kind of day one sales that you would have with an "established audience," but why go out of your way to do that when all you do will be inevitably piss off the fanboys (plus in this instance, Bob's right, it was done for the bookkeepers just to keep the contract away from Marvel.) Fandom of comic book movies are going to turn out for a "comic book movie" even if it isn't one of their established heroes. It may take longer, they may have to rely more on video and international, but the audience will see it. And they may end up with the new audience AND the fanboys flocking to a new and interesting IP.

Yes there's more risk in a new IP, but I think entertainment is closing in on an "event horizon" with all the reboots, sequels, prequels, remakes, adaptations, and just flat-out ripoffs that are being cranked out. I believe that very soon a breakout new IP is going to SHATTER everything in it's path in Hollywood, as the audience flocks to something new, fresh, and more interesting than the same played-out stories over and over.

And then of course, they will green light a sequel (curse you vicious cycle...)

But back to Spidey. Sure, I'll provoke the outcry. Ahem... "Bob is dead on, this is totally an attempt to capture the Twihards, Gleeks, and post-HSM fanteens in an attempt for Sony to delay the handover to Marvel for the longest amount of time possible."

It's a smart business move on their part, and I can't blame them for it. I'll just caution the "new" Spidey fans this... 5 to 7 years from now when Sony does it all over again, trying to reach the new "younger" fans by appealing to whatever the future angsty teen crap is; don't say you didn't see it coming.

Instead, do like I did. Whine and complain about how you may have liked it if it were a new IP. This (mostly) same story on a new hero? I may have enjoyed it. Instead, like Bob, all I see is where this movie attempted to (and rightly so) distance itself from its predecessor. And saw that at no time did it not make itself worse by doing what it had to do. In 0 instances did they ever do something that Raimi did right... better. It was always worse. In the rare cases where Raimi did something wrong (mostly from 3) well... do you want a medal for picking the low hanging fruit?
 

Raesvelg

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Well, I see Bob has gone full-on Raimi-fanboy nerdrage, which is pretty much what I expected out of him for this one. Which is a shame, since I wouldn't have minded seeing an actual objective review.
 

CronoT

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All I have to say about Bob's review of this movie is...

Damn!

I've seen people get upset about their dog being run over and not be that pissed.
 

antipunt

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OK, so the movie SUCKS. There is absolutely nothing good about it.

My bias-sense is tingling.
There is way too much movie politics involved to expect this review to be impartial..
 

anthony87

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Fusioncode9 said:
Looking through these comments is just pathetic. Most people here are deciding not to see the movie because of Bob's pointless fanboy rage. Mos reviews call it a solid film, even Roger Ebert enjoyed it. I've seen the movie and it is NO-WHERE near as bad as Bob is saying. It's no The Dark Knight but it's a overall a solid film.

Nooners said:
I figured this would would suck, sadly. Thanks for the advance warning, Bob. Should've listened to you when you said not to see Green Lantern.
TorchofThanatos said:
okay then, thats another movie I wont go see
I wonder if the Avengers is still playing... hmmmmmm...
rayen020 said:
never planned to see it and now i'll make sure not to.

Also why do all your tuesday reviews have movies that suck?

FastLogan2400 said:
Ouch. I was really hoping this movie wasn't going to suck as hard as everyone thought it was going to, but now I'm definitely not seeing it after hearing this.
C'mon guys, form you own opinions!
I actually love you for this post.

It always gets to me when I see people basically posting "Oh Bob you're so right! Not that I've seen the movie or anything like that but it's you so of course you're right!"
 

Aerograt

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Bob, to spite this piece of shit, I'm going to go watch Spiderman. Yeah, the good one with Toby.

Five bucks this gets a sequel and screws up JJJ.
 

MANIFESTER

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I don't get all the "I wanted an impartial/objective/unbiased review" comments. From my perspective, all reviews are simply the opinions of the author overall. Sure you can have facts in there, but it is still opinion. Isn't it usually called the movie "experience". In that we can all experience it differently. That is why some people love say The Dark Knight and think it is one of the best summer blockbusters of all time while others think it is highly overrated.

There is a reason why I watch reviews, and more importantly why I really only pay attention to a few of them. Its because I want the opinions of someone who has already seen the film. Most of the time, when Bob says a movie is good, I agree. Percentage is lower, when he lets loose his vitriol, but I still usually agree.

Anyway, I was afraid this was going to be a bad movie, but after watching the review I am certainly not going to watch it in Theaters. Maybe I will watch it when it comes to my local library.
 

BehattedWanderer

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Jun 24, 2009
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Bummer. I was kinda hoping this would at least be decent.
Sis said:
Whenever someone asks me why I think your opinion should be taken with a grain of salt half the time, I'll point em to this video. You've been against this movie since before anything got announced besides that it's going to happen. And it shows. Even if this movie was The Dark Knight levels of good, you'd probably still say it was bad.
I don't think Bob is resentful enough to not love a comic book movie as good as The Dark Knight, or, since we're on topic, something like Spider Man 2. He'd have ranted about how all the production issues will harangue the box office results, which would be sad, or some similar nonsense. I'm not arguing against that grain of salt this time, however, since he will be particularly bitter about comic book movies done badly, but I'm pretty sure he would look past his earlier misgivings if it had turned out to be amazing. Granted, when they fail, he goes hunting for the biggest and rustiest of nails and the roughest, most splintery wood for the impending crucifixion, but if you consider how awful something like either the Expendables or Green Lantern were, and how much ire he through their way, I'm inclined to follow his opinion of things that suck more easily than things that are fantastic.
 

Atmos Duality

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Eh. Sounds like it would just maintain my status-quo: All Spiderman Movies suck.
(In my opinion, if you couldn't deduce that)

I stopped giving them a chance after Spiderman 2, in which Doc pulled a shiny golden polyhedron of "Tritium" out of the wall safe (first and only time I ever audibly yelled BULLSHIT at the screen in a movie theater).

The trailers showed some very good lines and gave me a bit of hope for this movie (something I could not say about Gangrene Lantern), but I see that we've gone back to showing the only entertaining scenes in the movie first; and nothing else.

Welp. Here's to hoping Nolan's Batman 3 doesn't suck.
 

chaosyoshimage

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Hey guys, you might want to see it for yourself to know whether or not it really sucks. I personally loved it and I think it's my favorite Spider-Man movie. It's way less cheesy than the Raimi films while still fun, yet capturing the essence of Peter Parker far better than those films. The worst complaints I've seen are that Andrew Garfield is too cool or attractive (This may be the shallowest complaint I've ever heard), the film is too much of a retread (It does things differently enough and focuses more on character than the previous films, Uncle Ben feels like more than a plot device), the Lizard is too much like a B-movie villain (I'll give them this one, but I felt like his B-movieness was fun), and that it's just a cash grab.

All movies are cash grabs, Webb clearly put his mark on this film and I'm not seeing this made by commitee BS that I'm seeing on the internet. Is it because they had to do another one to keep the license? So what? That shouldn't be held against the movie, the film should be judged on it's own merits. Anyway, I found this version of to be a much more modern take on the Spider-Man mythos than the original films. Especially with Peter, the kind of nerd we see him as in the Raimi films is a Hollywood fabrication, the angsty, neurotic, awkward guy who can still joke around is the type of nerd I was in High School and I'm glad to see that represented instead of a Big Bang Theory-style caricature.

That said, I DO enjoy the Raimi films, I just don't think they're the perfect Spider-Man movies, this isn't either, but I think it's closer. I'm pretty much only posting because both sides of this argument need to actually watch the movie before coming to these conclusions about it. If you think it looks terrible the only way to confirm it is to see it, not by watching/reading one person's review, same goes for the people that think it looks good without having seen it and are attacking reviewers for giving it a bad review.

Anyway, I thought it was good, some critics think it's good, some think it's bad, see the movie before you make up your mind about it.
 

chaosyoshimage

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Carnage95 said:
I've been a Spider-Man fan since I was three or five years old and I absolutely adore him. I saw the film twice and I love every minute of it! Sure there were a one or two things that they didn't include that made me a tad disappointed, but overall this film is THE Spider-Man film I have been waiting for. Andrew Garfield totally nails it as Peter Parker and he looks like him too. The film also tugged on my heartstrings where as the previous trilogy didn't do anything for me.

The previous trilogy was a total cheese-fest, the main cast's acting was mediocre and I've always cringed at the dialogue between Peter and Mary Jane. The only actors that I felt that stood out were Bruce Campbell and J.K Simmons. Other than the costume design, Tobey's Spider-Man didn't act like Spider-Man. Hardly any wisecracking and taunting of his enemies.

Go watch this film if you love Spider-Man because this is the one I was waiting for and they delivered.

Also to those who aren't going to watch this film because they want it back with Marvel Studios, go watch the film seriously. If you didn't know, Sony and Marvel might make a deal to have Spider-Man join the Marvel Cinematic Universe. There was a rumour that the OSCORP building was going to be in The Avengers, however they took it out because of the timing of the films. There were interviews conducted that have asked if Spider-Man could join the MCU and they said if Spider-Man does well, they might work something out.

http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fansites/MarvelMovieverseNews/news/?a=61371
http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fansites/eyegloo/news/?a=62896

Edit: Fixed the link issue.
All of this, especially the part about tugging heartstrings, this movie hit me a lot harder than the Raimi trilogy and it pisses me off a little to see people call it "soulless". I literally teared up at a couple of parts.
 

MrBrightside919

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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*
 

Raesvelg

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MANIFESTER said:
I don't get all the "I wanted an impartial/objective/unbiased review" comments. From my perspective, all reviews are simply the opinions of the author overall. Sure you can have facts in there, but it is still opinion. Isn't it usually called the movie "experience". In that we can all experience it differently. That is why some people love say The Dark Knight and think it is one of the best summer blockbusters of all time while others think it is highly overrated.
There's a difference between the objective opinion of the author of a review, and a situation where the reviewer went into a film hating it right off the bat and refusing to give it even the slightest shred of objective consideration.

This is clearly a case of the latter.
 

Reincarnatedwolfgod

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i got a feeling movie bob is filled with fan boyish rage by the way he talked.
and it did not sounded like a professional review. it seemed more like a rant like review

i have not seen it and i don't plan on seeing it to began with due to being indifferent towards spiderman in general
so i will never know how bad or good this film is i am just making an observation on how movie bob sounded like

personalty if i had interest in watching this film i would ignore this review. due to it feeling unprofessional
from what hear on this thread movie bob hated the idea of this movie when it was first announced

edit:
also he was talking almost as fast as yahtzee at times
 

Waaghpowa

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Apr 13, 2010
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You know, a lot of these posts would be less pathetic if people had bothered to see the movie before taking someone elses opinion.

I criticize the hell out of the Batman movies, but at least I go see them for myself rather than be a drone to opinions of others.