On My Shelves: The Amazing Spider-Man 2

 

I was reluctant to see the second entry in the quick reboot of the Spider-Man franchise, despite the fact that I really, REALLY liked the first entry. My reluctance stemmed from two things. First, there were three villains advertised, and multi-villain films have a history of having… issues. (see Spider-Man 3, Batman 2, etc.) Second, the combination of Gwen Stacy and Green Goblin pretty much added up to Biggest Tragedy of Spidey's Life, which I saw as meaning a pretty damn downer of a film.

 

I was entirely right.

 

I was also entirely WRONG.

 

THIS is Spider-Man. This is the best realization of Spider-Man I have ever seen. Andrew Garfield IS Spider-Man. I thought he was an excellent choice in the first film; in this one he OWNS the role. Tobey Maguire was a good – a very good – Spider-Man, but he comes off as second to Garfield in every way. Garfield looks like a gawky teenager. He has the Parker charm combined with hangdog "can't win for the losing" look that the real original Spidey had. When he does the webswinging quips, they're natural, they flow, and they carry the nervous, excited energy that Spider-Man projected – they're both taunt and shield for Spider-Man, an aid to keep him focused on the job, away from the peril, and to keep his foes unbalanced.

 

At least for this role, Garfield is also a better actor than Maguire. I believe Garfield as the outsider, the geeky loser who hides a hero inside himself, who takes responsibility for everyone around him because of one failure on his part.

 

That's a necessary – a vital – part of what makes The Amazing Spider-Man 2 work as a film. You must believe in Spider-Man.

 

I suspect some negative press comes from fans who saw that they changed a bunch of details in the various parts of the Spider-canon – and no mistake, they did change details. Yet… I found the changes were good. Really, really good.

 

The original Electro? A loudmouthed oversized thug who happened to get electrical powers. I never felt particularly sympathetic towards him, he was just one of the more powerful roadblocks thrown at Spider-Man.

 

The film's Electro is a much better, poignant realization of the overall concept – a villain whose schtick is controlling and being powered by electricity. Max Dillon is a sympathetic figure at first, one of those brilliant types who can't connect with people, self-effacing, afraid, and who latches on to any sign of approval, of recognition, desperately and completely.

 

This is, of course, also what creates stalkers and fanatics. Max becomes Electro because he is ignored and abused and taken for granted, and it is that treatment that leads to the accident that creates him. Even then, Spider-Man might have gotten through to him, if not for an overly-eager sniper. Obsessive approval in a stalker can convert instantly to obsessive hatred at an apparent rejection, and that is what happens with Max (and most likely the changes to his physical nature and the trauma of the accident didn't help).

 

The parallel thread of Peter dealing with having been asked by Captain Stacy – with his dying breath – to "keep Gwen out of it", and Gwen herself insisting he let her in, is well done, and while terribly painful, completely believable for the characters. This IS what teenagers and very young 20-somethings go through, especially if you add extraordinary pressures to their normally volatile relations.

 

Emma Stone's Gwen Stacy is note-perfect; beautiful, intelligent, active, decisive; she loves Peter, but she will not let him keep whipsawing her, and she won't let him make decisions for her – even when it brings her into danger – if there's something she thinks she can DO. She is very much her father's daughter, and it is obviously partly that which draws the two of them together; they both feel that responsibility for others.

 

Dane DeHaan does a wonderful job of bringing Harry Osborn to life – again, as a sympathetic figure with what unfortunately is an inherited disease, and possibly psychological weakness that the pressures of his approaching death, loss of his father, and maneuverings of the corporation he's inherited push to the breaking point.

 

And the thread that ties all of them together is Oscorp, Norman Osborn, and Peter's parents, with a secret going back decades. This is woven into the narrative very well, to the point that the final confrontations seem as inevitable as a Wagnerian tragedy. Peter breaks himself saving the city, impossibly, from deadly threats, Gwen has her moment of triumph, and then at the hands of the (as yet unnamed) Green Goblin, falls to her inevitable death at the end of a strand of spider-webbing.

 

A dark tragic end of one of the most heartrending sagas in Spider-Man's entire history.

 

And yet…

 

And yet…

 

… The producers refuse to leave it at that. They let Spider-Man grieve. They show us him a broken man. They show us a city without him.

 

And then they find a way for Gwen Stacy to call him back from beyond her own grave, in a manner that made both my wife and I cry. And the end is a triumph, not a loss, leaving me feeling GOOD about having seen this movie, not bad, not sad, not depressed.

 

That, my friends, is art in making a superhero film. Show me the darkest chapter in my hero's life… and yet keep me from walking out under a cloud.

 

One very significant change – and one I very, very much approve of – is that for the most part, the city of New York is shown to LOVE Spider-Man. Maybe J. Jonah Jameson doesn't like him, but most of the city knows he's a hero, cheers him as a hero, and misses him terribly when he's gone. Parker's life sucks enough; at least give him the recognition he's due.

 

And all the Easter Eggs hidden in this film? Good lord, I could write a whole post on those alone.

 

In case I haven't said this clearly enough, I LOVED this film. I dunno what other people were watching that made the overall rating less than 6.9 on IMDB, but they weren't seeing what I saw. This is one of the best superhero movies ever made, and one hell of a pleasant surprise. I was VERY disappointed to hear that now that Marvel has the rights they do not intend to keep Garfield on; he really deserves to keep the role long enough to bring the Web-Slinger into the Cinematic Marvelverse, and I think it's a mistake not to do so.