With the release of Mark Webb's 'The Amazing Spider-Man' arriving on the 3rd July, let me take you on a short journey through it's main competition. Sam Raimi did an amazing job with spider-man, the first movie in my opinion is still one of the best super hero movies ever made. Sadly they do get worse as they go along. The big question is can Mark Webb so better? The bar has been set pretty high, he's got a lot of fans to win over this this remake. By the way, this post will contain spoilers.
Our journey begins back in 2002 with 'Spider-Man', we all know the story of Peter Parker, a teenage school boy who is at the bottom of the food chain at high school, he lives with his aunt and uncle because his parents died when he was young. On a school trip to the genetics division of Oscorp Peter is bitten by a radioactive spider, which alters his DNA, turning him into something more than human. He initially uses his powers in order to make money to by a car, but his rash decisions lead to the death of his uncle and his decision to become the amazing Spider-Man to fight crime and prevent anyone from going through the pain he has endured. Basically this film was (and still is) great, Tobey Maguire was perfectly cast as Peter Parker, likewise with Willem Dafoe as the Green Goblin. Raimi made a risky decision by scrapping the hand made web shooters that Parker used in the comics and went for a biological approach, which many have claimed to be a really smart decision because it makes the story easier to tell, and it puts his mark on the films, making them his own. One of the decision which wasn't so well received (but which me and many others do still approve of) was the decision to give the Green Goblin a more realistic costume in order to make him look less gimmicky (which was actually Dafoe's idea), I think it was the beginning of more realistic superhero movies, a trend which very popular with filmmakers today.
With the success of 'Spider-Man' a sequel was inevitable, so in 2004 we were presented with 'Spider-Man 2', the story revolves around Peter struggling to balance his life as Spider-Man and as Peter Parker, and is forced to make some difficult decisions regarding his future. In the mean time Alfred Molina stars as Doctor Otto Octavius/ Doc Ock,a science who's experiments with four mechanical arms with artificial intelligence goes wrong, with deadly consequences. I quite liked this movie, in my opinion it wasn't as good as the first one, but it still kept a lot its charm. I think it would have been better if there was more action involved, because Doc Ock doesn't seem to be in it very much, it's mostly just scenes of him building his machines, but the two big fight scenes between him and Spider-Man are really good (especially the one on the train).
Concluding Raimi's 'Spider-Man' Trilogy is 2007s 'Spider-Man 3' which continues the story of Peter Parker, now that hes balanced his life as Spider-Man and Peter Parker, he now has to balance his life between Spider-Man and Mary Jane. A ghost from the past comes back to haunt him, and a strange alien substance arrives on Earth and attaches itself to Parker, gifting him new strengths, and brings out his inner evil. 'Spider-Man 3' had a lot that was right with it, but even more that was wrong with it. One of these things that were right was the casting of Thomas Haden Church as Flint Marko/The Sandman, I think he pulled the character off really well, it's a shame that although the film is only a few years old, the effects haven't beaten the test of time, and now the transformation of Flint into The Sandman, looks awful. Also I think the alien costume scenes were done really well, successfully showing the substance enhancing Peters characteristics, especially his anger. I quite liked James Franco's Harry Obsborn taking on his fathers role of the goblin, now named the 'New Goblin', his new tech and vendetta against Peter (now that he knows Parker is Spider-Man)I like Topher Grace as an actor, I thought it was great in 'Predators', but he was a poor choice for Eddie Brock/Venom. Anyone who has ever read the comics or watched the animated series knows what Eddie Brock is supposed to be like.He's not big enough or angry enough to play Brock. I didn't think the effects on venom looked that bad, it was an interesting take on him, but you didn't see enough of Venom as a whole, half the time we see Venom with Brock's face. Now we come to the biggest mistake of this movie, they killed off Venom in less than twenty minutes (give or take, I'm sure on the exact time amount)! He is the most important villain in the franchise and they discarded with no hope of return! How stupid! Without Venom, we can't have Carnage, and Carnage is awesome.
So there we have it, you now know my views on Sam Raimi's 'Spider-Man' Trilogy, interestingly, even though 'Spider-Man 3' wasn't as well received as the other two movies, Sony still wanted a sequel, there was a lot of talk that Maquire had agreed to return as Spider-Man and that there would either be a fourth and fifth movie shot back to back, or a fourth on its own, then a fifth and sixth shot back to back. There was also rumours that the villains in these films were going to be The Vulture (apparently John Malkovich had been in talks with Sony) and The Lizard. Also Anne Hathaway had been considered to play Felicia Hardy. However, she would not transform into The Black Cat like in the comics, but a whole new superhero with a new set of superpowers, called The Vulturess. Apparently Sony and Raimi had many disagreements between 2007 and 2009 over sequels, and in 2010 Sony announced that 'Spider-Man 4' had been cancelled.
THIS NEXT PARAGRAPH IS ALL MY IDEAS AND OPINIONS REGARDING THE STORY OF THE NEW MOVIE AND FUTURE RELEASES BASED ON WHAT INFORMATION HAS ALREADY BEEN RELEASED. IF I'M RIGHT THEN IT MAY CONTAIN SERIOUS SPOILERS (ONLY IF I'M RIGHT).
So what can we expect from Mark Webb's 'The Amazing Spider-Man'? So far we have seen that there is a new Spider-Man (whose humour seems more relevant to the comics), a new costume, we now have web shooters (a good merchandising move) and a new villain. Well there's two new villains, we've seen plenty of The Lizard (whose design seems to date back to some of the very first Spider-Man comics), but we've not been shown anything of The Proto-Goblin (not even some concept art), so when we see him on screen (most likely at the end), it'll be a first for everyone. We also know that The Lizard (played by Rhys Ifans) launches a biological attack on the city, which I think will be the biogenic decombinator, when he attempts to make everyone in the city like him. If I've got that right, then it opens so many doors for stories in later movies, like Morbius and the Man-Spider. But what of The Proto-Goblin? My guesses are that they're going to use him as a replacement of The Green Goblin, and follow the story line where the Goblin kills Gwen Stacy, which in turn, bring together Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson. As far as Spider-Man himself is concerned, his current origins in the new movie is different to that of Raimi's 'Spider-Man', in that Peter has always had something inside of him that makes him special, and that the spider bite just brings out that something and merges the spider DNA with it, turning into Spider-Man.
I am really excited for 'The Amazing Spider-Man', I can;t wait to see what direction Webb takes the franchise in. The fact that they've already announced the release date for 'The Amazing Spider-Man 2' in 2014 shows that Sony must really have faith in this movie. I hope it's everything I want it to be, I suppose we'll all have to wait and fine out June 29th.
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