I think there’s a really anti-reboot/remake sentiment in the
general public. It’s like having new revisions somehow diminishes the
originals. I don’t mind remakes at all. It’s another chance at making a story great. If it ends up being bad, I could just ignore it. I don’t remember much from the Sam
Raimi Spiderman films. I’ve watched the first two movies maybe twice, and the
third once in the theatre. They were decent films for sure. I just remember a
generally good vibe from those movies. I think the third had some problems
which could have been fixed.
By now, I’ve probably seen the origin story for Peter Parker
half a dozen times. He’s a photographer/high schooler nerd who gets bit by a special
(radioactive, sometimes genetically modified) spider. He abuses his powers at
first, until through inaction, he caused the death of his Uncle Ben. He then
figures out to use his powers responsibly to do some actual heroics.
I think this version of the retelling the best I’ve seen. It shows a version of Peter Parker who isn't above lying to various people to get what he wants.
My problem with the movie is that so much of it was
unrealistic. I’m willing to allow the idea that a spider bite can give super
powers, or that a man can inject reptile DNA and regrow his arm. That comes
with the price of admission.
What I don’t find realistic is Oscorp. They supposedly have
twenty (non summer) intern positions available for highschool students. That’s
a bit strange, I suppose. I guess if they were students with a lot of
potential, Oscorp would want to ‘lock’ them in. Fine. (I loved the idea that
there’s a place in fiction with hundreds of bustling scientists in the
background doing SCIENCE acitivies!) The problem is that Oscorp has worst security in the
world. Peter was able to sneak into a place filled with GM spiders. It was just a single layer of door passcodes. I think most computer OS require you to type your password for every significant change. What they should have done to get Peter his power was to have the interns shown a new batch of genetically modified spiders. The spiders could have been demonstrating hostile behaviors forcing them all to be incinerated. Maybe one of them survived by hiding behind some extra durable webbing, and manages to bite Peter Parker.
Later on in the movie, Gwen Stacy, another intern, was
able to go up to a machine and just fabricate a serum that modifies genetic
material. That’s insane, especially when you consider that the place has
EVERYTHING NEEDED TO MAKE A BIOLOGICAL WEAPON in one of the world’s biggest
cities.
I think having Curt Connors as the villain could have
worked. I remember that a big portion of what made him sympathetic in the
show/comics was that he had a family, which was a driving motivation for
injecting the serum. From what we’ve
seen in this movie, he’s put a potentially fatal serum inside himself JUST
BECAUSE he wants another arm. I’m sure that Oscorp has a synthetic limb
division that would like volunteers. If the movie Connors had a wife and
son/daughter, and it was revealed that his amputated arm was the result of a genetic
defect that was passed down, then he would have had a non-selfish reason for
testing it on himself. Dr. Connors would have lived his entire life knowing
that he was physically defective and inferior. The only non-broken thing was
his intellect. He wants to find a cure so that his kids, and others like them,
wouldn’t have to suffer like he did.
Nope. Connors did it because it was his last chance to grow an arm. What’s that? 80% fatality rate? Who cares. He always loved his right hand.
When the Lizard found out that Spiderman was Peter Parker,
he wasn’t even shocked. I would have thought that a successful mutation that
yields amazing agility and wall climbing abilities would be at least
interesting for him. Lizard Smash. Wouldn’t it have been great if the Lizard
didn’t magically turn into a creature 3 times his human size? They could have
used the scale prosthetics shown in various scenes. You know, let the actor
genuinely act, instead of putting a cgi mask on his face.
I was mostly disappointed that a potentially humanizing
storyline with the Lizard was reduced to a conservation-of-mass-defying cgi
green monster.
The rest of the movie was pretty predictable. I think I’m
more disappointed with this movie because it was so close to being great.
Instead, it’s just good.
7/10
