See “The Amazing Spider-Man 2!” Watch the world-famous web slinger battle Electro, the Green Goblin, and Rhino! Stare in wonder as he juggles his romance with Gwen Stacy, reconnects with his best friend, and probes the disappearance of his parents! Will he defeat his enemies? Salvage his social life? Learn the truth about the past? Never before has this much movie been crammed into 142 minutes!
“The Amazing Spider-Man 2” is one of those movies where less would have been more. For nearly two-and-a-half hours, the movie struggles to keep more balls in the air than a juggling octopus. In the end, it drops all of them except one. This is unfortunate because any one or two of those balls would have made a great movie.
What works? The romance between Peter Parker (Spider-Man) and Stacy. Their scenes together are tender, sweet, and emotionally effective. You can feel the heartbeat of Spider-Man (the tension between helping others and pursuing what he wants, which will place those he loves in harm’s way) in these moments. There’s humor (I loved Stacy’s comeback for when Parker complains about how she pulled them into a closet to hide from bad guys - “I’m sorry I couldn’t take us to Bermuda for a hiding place!”), heartbreak, and even dread, for those who know how the comics resolved their romance.
That said, even the Parker-Stacy storyline wears thin. There’s too much “I love you, but I’m breaking up with you. Can we kiss? Are we back together? But I love you, so we can’t be together.” A more economic script, or a stronger hand in the editing room, would have improved the movie.
What else works? The humor. The writers gave Andrew Garfield (Parker/Spidey) some fun banter for the actions scenes, making him more true to the Spider-Man of the comics than Tobey Maguire in the previous films. The visuals are nice, too, although Spider-Man looks too animated at times, and the action appears to be more computer-generated than filmed.
What doesn’t work? Everything else. I liked Jamie Foxx as Electro, but his storyline is mishandled. Max Dillon is a mentally imbalanced, socially awkward electrician who has an unhealthy obsession with Spider-Man. But he’s a fan of the webbed hero, not a mass murderer. Yet when an accident transforms him into Electro, he turns evil. It’s abrupt, with no groundwork.
Then there’s Harry Osborn, a.k.a. the Green Goblin. His character also feels shoe-horned into the movie. The previous series of Spider-Man movies spent three films developing this classic friendship; here, it’s slipped into the cracks between everything else. Also, while I liked Osborn’s reason for being angry with Spider-Man (he believes the web slinger’s blood can cure him of a lethal genetic anomaly, but Parker is afraid it would kill him, so he turns him down), actor Dane DeHaan plays Osborn weird from the get-go, so there’s no evolution from human to super villain, just a change in make-up.
While there are no glaring problems with Parker’s investigation of the disappearance of his parents, these scenes made me feel like I was at my grandma’s house for dinner, and she was piling more food onto my already full plate.
A few other things rubbed me the wrong way, but I’m starting to feel like I’m picking the scraps off the bones of road kill. I will mention one thing, though: When Norman Osborn dies, he leaves his $200 billion business to his son. Harry owns the company - lock, stock, and barrel. Yet the board of directors fires him and takes over ownership of those assets by trumping up false charges. Maybe I don’t understand how the business world works, but if I own something, I don’t see how someone can take it away from me at will.
I’ve made peace with the idea of a new series of Spider-Man movies so soon after the last trilogy, mainly because there are moments when the cast and crew have nailed the spirit of the character in a way Sam Raimi and company never did. But “The Amazing Spider-Man 2” has the stink of studio meddling all over it, and that’s unfortunate. Sony, which still holds the movie rights to the character, is likely more interested in setting up sequels and spin-offs than making one good movie. I wish they’d back off, because director Marc Webb and his writers clearly have a great Spider-Man movie in them, and I’d like to see them make it.
Two stars out of four. Rated PG-13 for sci-fi action and violence.