Peter Parker is your average high school teen. Socially awkward, living with his aunt and uncle, vying for a girl he may or may not be able to get, swinging around New York as a masked crime fighter....alright, so one of those things separates him from most other teenagers. As Peter starts to discover more about his newfound powers, he also starts uncovering clues about the disappearance of his parents, and the ties his father had to man named Curt Connors...
Scary newsflash: it has only been ten years since Sam Raimi's Spider-Man hit cinemas. After the second sequel to Raimi's monstrously successful film was met with much fan backlash, and Raimi himself decided he was done with ol' web-head, Sony Pictures made the decision to go with a reboot of the franchise, rather than risk another sequel (and after reading up on their plans for Spider-Man 4, thank merciful christ that they did). So was it even necessary? Well...
Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone make an infinitely better Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy than Tobey Maguire and Bryce Dallas Howard ever did, though in the case of the latter, she was barely in the much maligned Spider-Man 3 as it was. They have good chemistry, but I have to say Peter's hairstyle and passion for skateboarding made it painfully obvious that they were trying to appeal to the younger generation of today (i.e. the Twilight crowd). I've never understood the need for such a thing considering Spidey's popularity has never particularly waned, even before the Raimi trilogy came out. Garfield's discovery of his powers is rather fun however, even if it does get dragged out some. The supporting cast is fairly competent, and the actors portraying Flash Thompson and Curt Connors (Chris Zylka and Rhys Ifans) were both quite good. Somewhat ironic considering Zylka stunk so badly in Piranha 3DD, but that's another story.
Speaking of Ifans, despite my praise of his Curt Connors, I thought the Lizard himself was incredibly mediocre. It looked more akin to a Killer Croc cosplay rather than a man who had mutated into a giant reptilian/human hybrid. And honestly, was the addition of the character having arguments with himself really needed? We already had that with Norman Osborn, there was no need to revisit it. The fight sequences are pretty spectacular (whoops, guess that's a pun. Bleh), with the school fight and bridge scenes almost making up for the underwhelming last minutes of the movie itself.
One last complaint (and this'll be my last) was the absolutely non-existant relationship between Aunt May and Peter. The relationship between Ben Parker and Peter is handled well here, though with a less impacting death than it deserved. Afterwards, you never even get the sense that Peter cares for her, and there barely feels like any connection between the two. Anyone who has ever read a Spider-Man comic, or even glimpsed at one, knows how much the man cares for her and how he'd bend over backwards to keep her happy and safe. Perhaps they'll rectify this is a sequel, but who really knows. After all, according to the generation of now, older people be whack yo!
Overall, this is still a very fun film. It still feels too soon to reboot this franchise, but I'm interested to see where they take this new Spider-man. I've heard that plans will include two sequels, with actor J.K. Simmons expressing interest in returning as J. Jonah Jameson. Personally, I'd love to see him back, and I'd like to see some of the darker storylines in the comics explored and adapted to the big screen.
Then again, sometimes when we ask for that, we get Daredevil.
*shudder*
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