Anthony Stokes on The Amazing Spider-Man franchise…
As a film blogger, sometimes I wonder “am I too cynical?”. The sheer frustration I feel when reading certain things or watching certain trailers, like Michael Bay promising no goofiness in Transformers: Age of Extinction, is something that should belong to somebody past their mid-life crisis, not somebody in their early 20s. I suppose the frustrations comes from the fact that I appreciate the art of filmmaking so much. Movies are incredible, and when I see a lack of effort in a movie it irritates me no end. There are thousands of talented people who will never see their projects on the big screen, and so I think filmmakers need to keep that in mind and do the very best they can to make a movie as great as possible. I commend Zack Snyder and David S. Goyer for trying their hardest to make Man of Steel, a movie I dislike immensely, as good as possible. They get an A for Effort.
The Amazing Spider-Man franchise is probably one the movies I most dislike, but even I have to admit it’s not that bad. See what I did there? There’s a movie that didn’t appeal to me, but I didn’t call it overrated or say it was the worst movie ever. Yeah crazy notion I know. The reason I dislike it so much is because it’s not that bad, but it’s not very good either. It is purely average. This movie was made by a bunch of marketing executives, who tried to add in every element to make it appeal to everyone. This movie has the DNA of several franchises. It has The Dark Knight Trilogy’s aesthetic, with everything being dark and all the big action only happening at night and, this isn’t exclusive to Twilight, but there’s a bigger emphasis on a romance here because that sells pretty well now. And it’s not like other movies aren’t made to sell tickets – my favorite movie The Avengers is essentially two and a half hours of fan service – but here it’s so transparent.
Speaking of The Avengers, it has totally shifted the paradigm for Comic Book Movies. Now everything is about crossovers (as explored by Anghus Houvouras here). Somewhere, somebody made a joke that DC should be titled “Desperate Counter-Programming”, since its Cinematic Universe seems to be mirroring Marvel’s. Except unlike DC and Warner Bros., Sony only has Spider-Man. There’s only so much you can do, so the answer is to go bigger with the villains and do a Sinister Six movie. Amazing Spider-Man has already laid out its franchise until the fourth installment, which will more than likely be a Sinister Six movie. All arrows point in this direction and it goes back to what I was saying about this franchise containing no surprises since it’s so transparent.
The new poster for The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is the nail in the coffin for any surprises that might have been. Even the whole Gwen Stacy arc is pretty telegraphed – I’ve never even read the story, but I know where it’s going. So Spider-Man will have to face off against Rhino, Green Goblin, and Electro. Now, it would take a second to connect the dots and say that The Amazing Spider-Man 3 will have another 3 villains. Here’s my theory for what’s going to happen. Norman Osborn is essentially going to be the Thanos of the Amazing Spider-Man franchise. He’s going to be pulling the strings, and will have some hand in creating Rhino and Electro. At the end of The Amazing Spider-Man 3, he’ll probably get all the villains together and create the Sinister Six for the sequel. I could very well be wrong, but I have a feeling this will be the way things will play out given the foundations they’ve laid out so far.
As for the actual quality of the poster, I think it’s horrible. It’s cluttered, and it does nothing but reinforce “LOOK HOW BIG THIS IS”. And it doesn’t give the hero or the villains any personality. If this was fan-made they did a great job, but outside of that it’s pretty bad. Great concept, horrible execution.
I’m going to keep a sliver of hope alive and say that it’s possible The Amazing Spider-Man 2 takes me by total surprise and has me on the edge of my seat. Nothing would make me happier than to have the series do a complete U-turn and become one of my favorite franchises, and maybe even rival the original Sam Raimi trilogy. But at this point I just don’t see it. Sony seems to be more concerned with making money then making a good movie, which can be said of a lot of studios, but here it’s especially frustrating because of potential. Let’s hope I’m wrong…
Anthony Stokes is a blogger and independent filmmaker who also assists with the music blog DopesterMusic and co-hosts the podcast Delusional Losers.
Originally published December 3, 2013. Updated April 11, 2018.
