The Amazing Spider-Man

   It’s been a decade since Sam Raimi’s “Spider-Man” swung into the film world breaking box office records and jumpstarting one of the most successful film franchises of all time. Does the wall crawler stand up to the legacy before it with his all new reboot “The Amazing Spider-Man”? Let’s find out!

   The film begins as a young Peter Parker is dropped off at his aunt and uncle’s house before his parents depart forever… it’s never explained (or even remotely hinted at) what becomes of them.  Next thing you know we flash forward to a teenage Peter Parker getting bullied at high school and flirting with the popular girl. Ya know…the usual Peter Parker stuff. In fact, the first half of the movie is spent telling the same old Spider-man origin story, Parker gets bit, discovers his powers, uncle gets shot, Peter coulda saved him, Spider-man is born! Personally I would have just skipped the whole “getting to know you” phase considering most everyone under the sun already knows the origin of Spider-man not to mention Sam Raimi’s “Spider-Man” already covered this ground in great detail a mere decade ago. The 2008 film “The Incredible Hulk” is a great example of how you should reboot a series without being too redundant as it only spent about five minutes explaining the Hulk’s origin. That story had already been explained a few years earlier in Ang Lee’s “Hulk” much like Peter Parker’s origin had already been explained in “Spider-man” so why repeat history? Sure, it may sound like a petty reason to fault the movie but the origin story takes up half the movie causing “The Amazing Spide-Man” to run for over two hours!

   The latter half of the film features your standard “Doctor is obsessed with a cure and accidentally turns himself into a monster” story featuring The Lizard. It’s a simple premise but competent enough. This isn’t high art after all most of us just want to see some action and a good fight with these movies and “The Amazing Spider-Man” delivers just that.  Sure, its level of action may pale in comparison to “The Avengers” but it gets the job done none the less.

   Everyone does an adequate job of portraying their characters except one key member of the cast who just so happens to have the most important role in the film as Peter Parker … Andrew Garfield.  It’s not that his performance was bad but Peter Parker just comes off as a cocky, irresponsible jerk not a timid nerd with a heart of gold. This is just my personal preference but that’s not how I see the character and it’s kind of hard to root for some young punk.  

   Overall “The Amazing Spider-Man” is a good looking, fun movie definitely worth a watch but if you’re looking for something groundbreaking and new to the franchise like Chris Nolan’s Batman trilogy you’ll be out of luck because this film is the same old song and dance… whether or not that’s a bad thing is up to you but I personally would have liked to see something fresh done with the series.  I give it three and a half Spidey-heads.