The Big Picture: The Amazing Spider-Man - The Gwen Stacy Paradox

MovieBob

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The Amazing Spider-Man - The Gwen Stacy Paradox

MovieBob takes a look at one of Spider-Man's iconic characters - and her unfortunate destiny throughout the series.

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Aug 1, 2010
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Fabulous Illumination of Really Strikingly Timely and interesting content, bob.

I never really "got" Spiderman and I can't see how killing his girlfriend would really elevate the story in any way for me. The villains don't look great, Spiderman still looks whiny and the whole affair seems muddled and confused.

It's actually pretty interesting that an event in the canon of the character can be so old that it's basically established background information at this point.
 

Zontar

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Ah 70s and 80s marvel, when time actually moved. Now its been 25 years of condensed storytelling in a vacuum of time (yet that still connects to real life events in the world). I actually feel quite saddened by the fact history has stopped for Marvel in the comics.

OT: I think the thing which interests me the most about the movie is the fact that the trailers have a red herring of a scene which isn't even in the movie. Not something I'd like to start seeing happen.
 

Burnouts3s3

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Very good episode, Bob. I think what the movie does kind of ruins it for me.

In TASM2, Gwen gets LOTS of development in the movie. She tells Peter off for being a wishy-washy boyfriend, she helps Peter defeat Electro, gets interviews to Oxford and really comes out of her shell. But, she just dies in the last 15 (I think) minutes of the movie, Peter mopes for like 5 minutes (which the movies states is 5 months) and Peter gets her graduation ceremony pep talk and becomes Spider-man again just in time when Rhino was going on a rampage. Besides the convienence, it seems to me, Gwen gets all the late-game development so that the audience can have a reaction to her death. This is not character building for the sake of good character, but to get an emotional rise out of the audience.

What I want to know is how comics were able to get away with Gwen's death. Like you said, Bob, most of us thought of Gwen as another origin death. But, given this character's significance for her death, if comics were to kill a love interest nowadays, or even a character, you'd almost bet your bottom dollar that character would get revived or there'd be a huge protest about it. (Remember #Bringbrianback?) So, how were comics, back then, able to kill off Gwen without some sort of retcon trying to bring her back, and if they were to kill a character now, how do they make sure that character stays dead without an online petition/protest popping up?
 

SonOfVoorhees

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I watched the first one and Gwen left zero mark on me. With the second movie (not watched it) they are going to have to do some serious work with her and her relationship to make me give a shit about her if she does die.
 

Verlander

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Zontar said:
Ah 70s and 80s marvel, when time actually moved. Now its been 25 years of condensed storytelling in a vacuum of time (yet that still connects to real life events in the world). I actually feel quite saddened by the fact history has stopped for Marvel in the comics.

OT: I think the thing which interests me the most about the movie is the fact that the trailers have a red herring of a scene which isn't even in the movie. Not something I'd like to start seeing happen.
Agreed, but all of the Marvel Studios films trailers have scenes that are slightly different in the actual film, eg Pepper kissing the Iron Man helmet for the Iron Man 2 trailer, and Cap throwing his shield down a corridor for The First Avenger... I like how trailers aren't just spoilers from the films anymore. I try to watch the initial trailer, and keep it at that.
 

MatParker116

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Where the hell can they go with these spin off movies without giving Marvel reason to revoke there licence?
 

malestrithe

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My understanding of Gwen Stacy is that her clone is more interesting and complex of a character than the real person ever was.

Yes, she has a clone going back to the original Clone Saga, one that had all of Gwen's memories, but more personality. She decided that she could not be around Parker because he would live a lie. So she went to live in France, a place the real Gwen wanted to visit, but never got around to at the time.
 

Falseprophet

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Zontar said:
OT: I think the thing which interests me the most about the movie is the fact that the trailers have a red herring of a scene which isn't even in the movie. Not something I'd like to start seeing happen.
It's already pretty common. The marketing companies that cut trailers aren't necessarily working from the final cut of the film. They sometimes end up incorporating footage that doesn't get used in the final cut. One of the most infamous examples was the "helmet kiss" from the Iron Man 2 trailer [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPNADiSUEr0] that didn't make it into the theatrical release.
 

Ashoten

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Your still wrong about the first Amazing spider man movie Bob. It was good. Not great but it had some truly amazing moments and competent cinematography.
 

Zontar

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Verlander said:
Agreed, but all of the Marvel Studios films trailers have scenes that are slightly different in the actual film, eg Pepper kissing the Iron Man helmet for the Iron Man 2 trailer, and Cap throwing his shield down a corridor for The First Avenger... I like how trailers aren't just spoilers from the films anymore. I try to watch the initial trailer, and keep it at that.
Falseprophet said:
It's already pretty common. The marketing companies that cut trailers aren't necessarily working from the final cut of the film. They sometimes end up incorporating footage that doesn't get used in the final cut. One of the most infamous examples was the "helmet kiss" from the Iron Man 2 trailer [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qPNADiSUEr0] that didn't make it into the theatrical release.
You two make a good point, but those scenes where also added into the dvd and Blu-ray release of both movies, where as I doubt the "you're being watched" scene will be for ASM2 given how it would distract from the real plot too much.
 

malestrithe

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MatParker116 said:
Where the hell can they go with these spin off movies without giving Marvel reason to revoke there licence?
Disney wanted to make a Spider-Man cartoon. Sony was the obstacle preventing that because the license at the time gave Sony control of every Spider-Man appearance outside the comic books. So, Sony and Disney renegotiated the license that allowed Sony to keep the movie license in exchange for the television portion of it.

Basically, Sony has the Spider-Man movie license as long as they keep using the characters. They could keep making "bad" movies from here on out, but as long as they use the franchise, it remains in Sony's hands. Sony will not give up on it until a string of movies are not profitable, which will never happen. As long as production costs are down to about 100 million dollars, it will be profitable worldwide.

I am sorry, but you are going to have to get used to the idea that Spider-Man is not going to appear in the current popular vision of a Cinematic Universe anytime soon.
 

gridsleep

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I think the problem stems from basing billion dollar 21st Century movies on forty year old crap.
 

Uriel_Hayabusa

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As someone whose only experience with the Spider-Man franchise are some of the movies and some episodes of the cartoons, I'd definitely love to see more elaboration on what makes Mary Jane so compelling. She never struck me as that special from the things I've seen her in.
 

WindKnight

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Andrew Siribohdi said:
Very good episode, Bob. I think what the movie does kind of ruins it for me.

What I want to know is how comics were able to get away with Gwen's death. Like you said, Bob, most of us thought of Gwen as another origin death. But, given this character's significance for her death, if comics were to kill a love interest nowadays, or even a character, you'd almost bet your bottom dollar that character would get revived or there'd be a huge protest about it. (Remember #Bringbrianback?) So, how were comics, back then, able to kill off Gwen without some sort of retcon trying to bring her back, and if they were to kill a character now, how do they make sure that character stays dead without an online petition/protest popping up?
To put it simply, being female and not having powers are, individually, good signs your death is permanent... put them together, and its almost guaranteed, especially if its going to be a big motivational point for a male hero (look up 'women in refrigerators' for lots of examples).
 

Burnouts3s3

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Windknight said:
To put it simply, being female and not having powers are, individually, good signs your death is permanent... put them together, and its almost guaranteed, especially if its going to be a big motivational point for a male hero (look up 'women in refrigerators' for lots of examples).
...Except even now, civilian deaths can be retconned to never have happened. Remember Aunt May and the whole Mephisto and One More Day stuff?

That's the thing; how can ANY major character death stay permanent?
 

Epic_Bubble

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Just one thing that bothered me

I will put in spoilers just incase.

While the Green Goblin did throw Miss Gwen off a building to her death, he didn't kill her. It was Spider mans rush to save in the way in which he tried to grab her with his spider stuff that ended up causing such major whiplash that her neck broke.

So yeah it really was spiderman's sucky attempt at being a hero that ended up killing her. And yeah thats a really morbid way to die in a comic book so ill be surprised at how the movie attempt to portray it. Cause how do you take revenge on something you did, even if it was for the right reason, again that death was guilt, and isn't a premise for revenge more like emo remorse.

(Just slightly off topic , I would be interested on Movie Bobs take on the role of canon lore and how movie such as the recent Star wars Movie info simple does away with decades of story. Or how origin stories and plots get mashed up and reworked to make them more trendy)