Director: Marc Webb
Cast: Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Jamie Foxx, Dane DeHaan
Have I Seen It Before?: Yeah… But it was in one of those perfunctory, watch-on-demand viewings long after the obituaries on this series had already been written. I think Tom Holland may have already been cast as Garfield’s replacement at this point.
Did I like it?: In my review of The Amazing Spider-Man (2012) I ended up landing on the significantly positive side of the film, extolling three virtues:
1) Spider-Man (Garfield) is an active participant in his own origin story.
2) The James Horner score absolutely slaps, and we aren’t going to get any more of those.
3) I’m of a certain type who will be more impacted by encouraging words of decency from Jed Bartlet than I would be from Charly.
It’s sad that I have to report that this film continues none of what worked about its predecessor. Uncle Ben is mentioned, but he gets no flashbacks or voiceovers, whereas Captain Stacy and Peter’s parents do. It’s a weird omission, but the movie is already far too overstuffed with characters who have very little to do, why bring back Sheen?
On that note, Spider-Man as portrayed here has surprisingly little to do with the proceedings. He has no intention, other than being positive Danish in his level of indecision regarding his relationship with Gwen Stacy (Stone). Even the hero has little to do. It is as if the entire film is forged by the studio in their flailing attempts to keep the right for the character to revert back to Marvel. One wonders how there was such a shift from the first film, but there are Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci, getting primary credit for the screenplay. It’s probably for the best—in so far as big-budget spectacle movies are concerned—Orci can’t seem to get work anymore, and Kurtzman is relegated to a Rick Berman-esque role over the Star Trek franchise*.
Then there’s the music. James Horner is nowhere to be found here, and the score in its place is… Well, it’s bad. It inspires no feeling but is augmented with enough pop pablum to really make you want to stay as far away from the soundtrack as possible.
Some movie series die young and it feels like something has been stolen from us, and while there can certainly be arguments for the needlessness of rebooting the series for the first time, it is pretty clear another reboot was needed from here.
Although, to be fair, and I didn’t mention this in my review of the last movie, it is interesting that Andrew Garfield is the only wall-crawler of film who actually sounds like he might be from Queens. If only actors like Jamie Foxx and Paul Giamatti didn’t feel so out of place in the film.
*Don’t get me wrong, I like the new Star Trek, but my good will is ultimately an exhaustible resource.