Spider-Man 3

[Mithrandir]

Just got back from seeing Spider-Man 3 and I must say that it lived up to expectations and I was quite pleased with the result. The movie suffered from two bad back-to-back scenes which had similar flaws. In one Peter Parker is walking down the street acting like a douchebag (thrusting his hips, dancing to music only the audience can hear, nodding at every woman in sight, etc.). I'm guessing it was put in to show how the symbiote has changed him, but it is waaaaaay too long and just does not fit into the movie as a whole at all. It feels ridiculously out of place and should have been cut. In the very next scene there is a very similar problem: Peter Parker starts playing piano and then jumping around a jazz club acting like an idiot. It just doesn't fit. I like the idea of the scene (SPOILER: Peter, changed by the symbiote, flaunting Gwen in front of MJ), but its execution is poor. It feels like somebody just said "we need a Spider-Man dance number" and threw it in.

The beginning of the movie feels a little "busy" because Raimi has to set up the Peter Parker/Mary Jane relationship, Gwen Stacy, Harry becoming the new Goblin, Flint Marko's back story and transformation into Sandman and the arrival of Eddie Brock at the Bugle. I would have preferred more time be spent setting everything up and less on Peter Parker walking down the street being a jerk.

Those complaints aside, I really, really enjoyed the movie. Topher Grace is a fine Eddie Brock (I enjoyed how Brock was very much a mirror of Parker and my initial doubts of whether Topher could pull off Eddie Brock were eased), Sandman isn't just a throw-away villain before we get to Venom (it's debatable who the better villain is TBH), and Gwen Stacy's addition creates real tension and feels real. I would have liked to see Venom a little crazier and more violent, but that's just a personal opinion and there was nothing inherently wrong with Raimi's interpretation. The action scenes are, as expected, top-notch (especially the finale) and are worth the price of admission alone... plus the plot is pretty damn good too:)

Overall: 9/10 and it could have been a 10/10 if they cut the Peter-walking-down-the-street scene, tweaked the jazz club scene, and made Venom absolutely whacko.

Edit: There was a third scene I didn't like that I forgot to mention initially. Harry and MJ are cooking together in a kitchen semi-flirting and it just feels very corny. It's odd that the three scenes I mentioned are so incredibly bad and yet the rest of the movie is so fantastic.

[Baylan]

Eh, my personal take on the movie was much worse. Maybe its because of the environment that I saw it (8:55 on a Friday night in a very middle/early high school theater) but I thought it was atrocious. There was a ridiculous amount of crying, I feel like none of the new characters got developed well, and it lacked the key moment that the first two had -

Spiderman 1: With great power, comes great responsibility

Spiderman 2: I know you think we can't be together, but can't you respect me enough to let me make my own decision? I know there'll be risks but I want to face them with you. It's wrong that we should be only half alive... half of ourselves. I love you. So here I am - standing in your doorway. I have always been standing in your doorway. Isn't it about time somebody saved your life?

I don't remember any line from Spider-man 3 like I remember those lines... And so I don't remember the main themes, which in Spider-man 1 was: With great power, comes great responsibility, and in Spider-man 2 was: The hero can't do everything on his own.

It could also be the length, by the end of the movie, I really just wanted it to end. I think I've figured out the best way to know if a movie is great: watch it so that you're uncomfortable. If you still want to watch the movie, then its a great movie. I was uncomfortable for the entire movie (I was sharing a seat with my girlfriend because there weren't enough for us and all our friends in one spot) and I was ready for it to end about 20-30 minutes before it really did.

In any case, I'd give it about a 6/10. It was too long, the characters weren't developed well, everyone in the movie cried at least 3 times (or so it seemed, anyway), and the central theme wasn't clear to me. Thinking back on it now, the theme is forgiveness, but that wasn't clear throughout the movie.

And the ending with Venom was unacceptable. (I'll leave the spoilers out of here for now, but I leave it at unacceptable)

[Chesspiece_face]

I agree with Baylan. I thought this movie was, not only, the worst of the series but a complete trainwreck even taken by itself.

***Possible spoilers***

First the positives:
- The visual effects are MUCH improved in this movie. many of the faults of the first two have been ironed out and the action scenes are relatively enjoyable, although there are a lot of instances on incontinuity in the fight scenes. IE Spiderman has his mask on as we cut to goblin and when we come back to spiderman he no longer has the mask. there are many instances in the fight scenes where you get the feeling there was a large part of the fight you just missed out on. (see I lied even when talking about the positives i can't avoid all the faults of this movie...)

- Topher Grace. I promise, this time it's all good. A lot of people were upset when Grace was annouced as Venom but he is the only "True" character in this movie, and he plays Eddie Brock well.

Ok, now that i've talked about Topher Grace i've got through the one part of this movie that remains without the taint of SHAM. Back to your normally scheduled programming:

- Sandman. Jesus, where should i begin? This character really has no place in this movie. The inclusion of this character actually does so much to detract from the rest of the movie that I blame most of the problems of the movie as a whole directly on his shoulders. It's not that they don't attempt to build up the character and create a place for him, it's just that the role he is created to play would have been much more appropriate for Harry Osborne and you wouldn't have wasted 1/3rd of the movie failing to develop an entirely new character.

The character's sole purpose in this film is as an antagonist for peter's new-found aggression. Not only do they introduce this character and waste so much time trying to develop him, but much of that time is spent on ret-conning Peter's most defining moment. And it doens't work... AT ALL. You can tell this is a failled attempt when you watch the "conflict resolution" at the end of the movie. "What? You killed my uncle? you commited multiple felonies, along with unbelieveable property damage and personal injuries. Ok, I forgive you." *Exit sandman to float away into the sunset* Seriously. What happened to "with great power comes great responsibility"? It's obvious that the film makers created a pandoras box with Sandman that they couldn't close so after they were done with him they wanted to get him the hell off screen so the audience didn't think too much about it. It actually would have been better if they didn't even try to resolve this character. If he had just turned tail and ran away when he saw the tables turning on the battle it would have been much more acceptable.

Getting back to Harry Osborne. Lose the ret-con of Ben's death, Lose Sandman, and just take all that time to create more conflict and turmoil between Peter and Harry. Harry is a much more developed character, their conflict is much more believable and integral to the story, and he offers a much more realistic comparison for spiderman of what can happen if you take the path of revenge and anger. Then you throw in the catalyst of the symbiote and eventually venom and you have the movie this should have been. You really don't have to change the overall arch of the story either. The suit and venom in the end is just a metaphor for the anger and revenge that both peter and harry have to overcome. just stop wasting time on Sandman and stick with the characters that people actually care about.

- In the end that's the result of this movie. So much stuff that the audience just doesn't care about. Sandman has a whole sob story that he rolls out to spidey, but it doesn't matter because NOBODY CARES. They had the right idea of what kind of story arch they should make, they just bungled nearly every possible aspect of it along the way.

[Concillian]

- In the end that's the result of this movie. So much stuff that the audience just doesn't care about. Sandman has a whole sob story that he rolls out to spidey, but it doesn't matter because NOBODY CARES. They had the right idea of what kind of story arch they should make, they just bungled nearly every possible aspect of it along the way.

The alternative would be to have Peter / Spiderman helping out his daughter in exchange for not destroying half the city or whatever sandman would do. That part of the sandman plotline never got resolved at all. He floats away into the sunset, but in the end his daughter is still sick and still needs money to treat whatever illness she has. This was pushed hard as his motive for committing crimes in the first place, and if that hasn't been resolved then why would sandman just suddenly stop?

[vor_lord]

There were several moments that both my wife and I literally laughed out loud at some of the awful things in this movie. MST3K could really have a field day with some of this stuff. My wife is not critical of movies either so it's noteworthy how terrible some scenes were.

That said, other things worked well -- I can't say that I didn't enjoy the movie. It was so uneven throughout. It's not as bad as Xmen 3 was, and I wasn't bored. But it is definitely not up to the level of expectation that the first two movies set. The reason the first two were so good is that they did a great job on the characters, and it's very poor here. Everything about the Sandman other than the effects (which were cool) screams "B-MOVIE!!!!".

[Alrin]

Spoilers:

There were several parts of the movie that were just outright BAD. Like, they would fit in a Mr. Bean comedy where you look away from the screen because you feel so embarassed for the actor or w/e, but this is supposed to be "action" or something of the sorts.

Sandman felt like a hackjob but atleast it stayed true to the whole "stumbles into an experiment, gets nuked with X radiation, turns into supervillain" theme. That they suddenly dumped the murder of Ben on Sandman, god that was bad. "Ok we need an interesting angle to justify putting him and alot of cool CGI into the movie! I know, lets tie him into Parkers tragedies! Yes!"

I kindof liked the venom part. Parked pwned Eddie on the Bugle infront of everyone, that (coupled with the fact he thinks Parker stole 'his' girl too) is enough for him to go psycho-teeth-face when being linked with an alien symbiot. I liked this guy alot, they could definately have focused more on venom and goblin, leave sandhead out of the movie alltogether.

And finally. What the hell is with this harry-parker kiss and make up deal?
One little chat with his fathers old butler and harry goes off the psycho-steroids that makes the goblin GOBLIN?
Please. The goblin (in any form) is anything BUT reasonable. The final fight scenes with parker and harry together is laughable, clichés in their worst form. And harry, giving his life to save parker is again.. corny and so stupid. If you have time to intercept a bladed weapon thats hurling at your "new old best friend", you sure as hell have more time to push venom out of the way. But nooo. MUST. DO. CLICHE. SELFSACRIFICE!
/wrists

Please dont make any more Spider Man movies.
No really, PLEASE.

Or if you do, please include the following villains in Spider Man IV:
Carnage (Cletus Kassady)
Mysterio
Green Goblin (III) aka Harry Osborn's Psychiatrist
Venom 2099 (Future Venom comes back to stop Eddie from dying in SpiderMan3)
Will O' The Wisp (He has a cameo appearance as a flash of light, not really in the movie)
Hobgoblin (Like Green Goblin, but yellow) Huzzah!
Silvermane (Human brain, organs etc in a super-powered Cyborg body)
Doc. Oc resurrected and pissed off^2
Death's Head (Just because he's the coolest cyborg this side of the Future... errr.....)

Bonus if you can cram all of these into the first 30minutes of the movie.

[WarLocke]

The reason the first two were so good is that they did a great job on the characters, and it's very poor here. Everything about the Sandman other than the effects (which were cool) screams "B-MOVIE!!!!".

This pretty much sums up my reactions as well.

Why was Sandman in the movie? Three villains is way too much to fit into even a 150-minute movie, and frankly he had no purpose. Well, besides the horrible Uncle Ben retcon. You could remove Sandman from the film and (with a few edits in the last fight) it wouldn't matter a bit.

Venom. I've never been as big a fan of Venom as some, but he (it?) definitely got the short end of the stick in this movie. First he's introduced in a throwaway scene at the beginning that has nothing to do with anything (why didn't Raimi follow up on the hook he had in 2, where it's mentioned that Brock the astronaut just got back into town? The cartoon explanation of Venom would have at least been somewhat linked then), then we get some god-awful 'Emo Peter' scenes - of which the sidewalk crotch-thrusting and jazz bar scenes are the worst - then it bonds with Brock and for the rest of the movie Venom isn't even a character - just something for Spiderman to hit.

Topher Grace did a pretty damn good job as Eddie Brock. Too bad he had crap to work with. Seriously, even if someone got me fired from my job, my first reaction wouldn't be to go to church and ask god to kill the guy. What the hell? And after he bonds with venom he becomes even more one-dimensional. It's too bad, because Grace is a talented actor. He could have done much more with the part if the script had allowed it.

Here's my ideal Spider-Man 3:

Spidey is going about his business, finally getting some respect. Harry finishes setting up his XBox Goblin suit, and tears Peter up in their first fight. Stuff ensues, maybe another fight but mainly tension with them bumping into each other 'out of costume' and unable to fight (maybe because of MJ). Brock and Gwen are introduced.

Brock has just come back from the moon, and smuggled a moonrock home for his girlfriend. Peter somehow finds out about the symbiote in the rock and takes it to Doc Connor to look at it, and he tells Peter about it enhancing the wearer's strength and aggression (before Peter has ever worn it). Harry and Spidey fight again, and Peter loses. Getting desperate, Peter steals the symbiote from Connor's lab and puts it on to try to defeat Harry.

During the final fight, we see how the suit is already effecting Peter. At the beginning of the fight, he's trying to hold back because Harry is his friend. By the end, Harry is bloody and bruised and Peter is playing with him, like a cat will with a mouse before eating it. At some point in the fight Harry grabs Gwen and threatens to drop her off of something high (shades of Norman from Spidey 1), but when he does the new symbiote-enhanced Peter lets her fall to her death and instead goes for Harry. Brock is getting pictures of all of this for the Bugle of course, so he sees Spider-Man let his girlfriend die.

Spider-Man finally defeats Harry, and at the end the new Goblin begs for mercy. Knowing that if he lets Harry live he'll always have to watch his back (there's that symbiote thinking) Peter blows Harry up with one of his own pumpkin bombs. Last scene of the movie is Peter in civilian clothes later, just now realizing that he killed his own best friend.

Setup for Spider-Man 4:

- Peter is using/bonded to Venom, and hates what he's become and is doing
- Brock actually has a reason to hate Spider-Man, so when Peter finally throws off the symbiote in movie 4, there's a reason for Venom's single-minded spider hatred


Now, I came up with that in 15 minutes. I'm sure it could be better, but IMO that's already a better movie than the one we got.

[Mithrandir]

I didn't really mind Marko falling into a particle physics experiment and the symbiote just happening to land soundlessly near Peter Parker because comic books are rife with giant coincidences and I can suspend my disbelief when it comes to these origin stories. That said, the longer the time from my initial viewing of Spider-Man 3 and the more I have thought about it, the less happy I have been with the movie.

I didn't find the Uncle Ben/Sandman retcon as painful as some of you did apparently, but I do think that it was rather unnecessary. I didn't think it made Marko any more compelling of a character and I would have preferred that the movie focus on him getting money for his sick daughter. WTF happened with her? The snowboard for the new Goblin was kind of goofy, but whatever, I understand that they were trying to take Harry in a different direction visually than Norman.

I actually thought the Eddie Brock was set up pretty well in the movie - he clearly doesn't care about anyone but himself (see: more concerned about getting a Spider-Man photo than Gwen being okay after the crane incident) and takes it to a whole new level once Petter has ruined his career and stolen his girlfriend.

Word is that Raimi won't be returning for Spider-Man 4 because he is demanding more creative control over the future movies - makes you wonder what exactly the studio did to the movie that Raimi didn't like.

[Frag]

Tori & I saw the movie this evening and in the suspension-context bought nearly everything that is being complained about as believable. As an actor, as well as a longtime Spidey reader, I don't see the need to nit.

YMMV,
~Tori & Frag B)

[Zarathustra]

This movie did not live up to the hype, nor my expectations (which were not as high as the hype).

Sandman was a hack job and I would have much rather seen more of the conflict between Spiderman and Venom. I mean, wasn't that WHY they introduced Venom to the movie? They knew it'd attract the fans, and they they failed to deliver. Venom just didn't seem to... do anything besides be pissed off at Peter Parker.

The special effects on Spiderman and Venom were so-so... but the Sandman was phenomenal. They really did a great job on that part.

I think my biggest problem with the movie was characterization. Sandman's daughter was an attempt to humanize him and I feel they pushed it to far. They kept telling me I was supposed to feel for him... but I never got there on my own, despite the proddings. Peter's transformation via the symbiote was over the top and hokey, and I will never let them live down that "emo" haircut.

Give me a break.

The final straw was Harry's change. The friend with whom I was watching the movie turned to me and said "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree," when we saw Harry walk out of the green mist. He's out for vengeance. He's pissed. And the conversations with his father indicate he has similar psychiatric problems that will be pronounced through the good ol' green stuff. Suddenly all that is forgotten and he's a different character.

Throughout the movie, I found the acting weak. That was pretty much an all-encompassing complaint. Harry is TOO friendly at some points. Mary Jane is TOO weepy. Peter is TOO much of a douche.

They hyped the movie up, spending an enormous amount on promotion. It paid off and they got their numbers in the box office. In the long run, though, they messed up. I won't be seeing another Spiderman movie in the theatres. I'll wait for the DVD.