Now normally I would have my rating up here already, but this time, I want to actually have it at the bottom of my reviews from now on for two reasons. 1) I'm starting to realize how showing my rating on the top is kind of a spoiler for you guys who might want to actually read my reviews, and 2) with this particular film, considering the reception it has right now, I honestly would really like you guys to hear me out with what I have to say. So so from here on out, I'm going to try to get into the habit of giving you my review first, and my rating later. But enough of that, let's get to Amazing Spider-Man 2.
Plot: Spider-Man is continuing to fight crime while he is trying to figure out his life as Peter Parker with the mystery about his parents and his relationship with Gwen Stacy. But things get a little more complicated when Peter's old friend Harry Osborn discovers that he has a generic disease that is killing him and he believes that Spider-Man can cure him. And to top it off, an accident at Oscorp causes Max Dillon to turn into Electro and cause destruction in New York.
Oh! My! Gosh! That was...ah heck I'll say it: Amazing! I mean, yes it's in no way perfect, I mean there are some big problems that a lot of people have that I'll talk about. But from what they had, I ended up getting so much more than I really hoped with this film, which left me leaving the theater pretty happy. The cast was great; Andrew Garfield - while a little distracting with his stuttering - was better than ever as Spider-Man and Peter Parker. He had funny moments, he had serious moments, and they actually showed his friendly side when he was interacting with the civilians, cops, and even firemen. And I loved that they did that, because that made him even more of a lovable, charming hero then he already was in my eye. It was also nice that we got a good amount of both Spider-man and Peter Parker so that one didn't really leave out the other. And they have this upgrade with the suit which was perfect. Emma Stone was also better than she was in the last film as Gwen Stacy. She and Garfield had so much more time to develop the relationship with their characters and let it shine, and boy did they succeed to the point that a lot of people - whether they like this movie or not - found their realtionship to be one of the best parts of the film. We also thankfully got much more development with Sally Field as Aunt May, which was really nice considering that she didn't get a whole lot from the last film. Then we also get Dane DeHaan as Harry Osborn, and ... looking back and hearing some people's view of him in the movie, I do agree that he needed more work and most likely should've been in the first movie. But I still liked how we got this different point of view on the character compared to James Franco's performances in the original films. In fact, looking back, Harry was very psychotic in the comic books, and comparing the books to what DeHaan does here, what they did here actually makes a fair amount of sense. And then you got Jamie Foxx as Electro, and boy did I just about get as much as I hoped from him in a good way. The special effects for him where good, his performance was very interesting, and I loved how they went into his mental torture with the track "My Enemy", which was my personal favorite part of the soundtrack. It may seem like a really silly part of that particular scene, but to me, it was different, it was deep, and it worked in it's own way. And I know a lot of people disliked how Rhino turned out for this movie and...yeah, I can see it. But too me, I also think it works in a way where he was kind of meant to be like The Box Ghost in Danny Phantom, where he's a threat, but not entirely in a serious manner. Granted, I haven't read a whole lot of comics of Rhino, and I've seen both funny and also serious sides from the ones I have read. But for what they had here, it made sense to me. The action was also very enjoyable. I really liked how they gave us so much better stuff when it came to Spider-Man's strength, agility, web shooters and especially spider sense, and what they had when it came to Electro's abilities worked well too. Now here's where I talk about the thing that seems to be the biggest issue about the film that has people dislike this movie: the plot. In the eyes of a lot of people, it was unfocused and had way too many things going on for it to work as a story, let alone a film. Now for what the plot had, honestly, I couldn't get enough of what was happening...but that's a personal opinion as a Spider-Man fan. To be very clear, as much as I want to say that there wasn't too much, there is a degree where even I have to admit that those people are right. This movie gives us a ton of stuff that is from the comics whether it has to do with Peter's past, his enemies, his relationship with Gwen and the like. And while most of those things where done very, very well, they do seem to make the film a little out of focus when you look at the movie as a whole, especially if you are not familiar with the comics. But at the same time, the over use of story lines never really came close to being so bad that it really hurt the movie for me personally. And I'm really glad it doesn't, because no matter what problems there where with each thing that was happening, I was pleased with that they gave whether those moments made me laugh, smile, be intrigued, and even sad. Even if having all of that in one movie made the moving a mixed bag for a lot of people - as sad as that really is to hear - I really don't feel that it was such a problem that we should overlook how the story lines where done individually. But I also have heard people complain about the movie being nothing but a movie that is just for leading to a Sinister Six movie. Honestly, if that's really part of what ruined this movie for you, I think it's appropriate to say that you really have no one to blame but yourself in a way. Because it's stuff like this that makes it part of the reason why I do everything in my ability to avoid trailers, images and news about movies that I am really looking forward to. We live in a world where they tend to give us too much information just from most of the first official trailers alone. And I'm pretty sure that even the average viewer - not just film/superhero buffs like me, knows that by now. So as far as I would know, if you're one of those people who felt that way, I think it's possibly your own fault for focusing so much on the big picture and not try to view it as just a movie first, and look at the big picture later. There's more to this, I'm sure, but that's my basic take on the issue. Now to summarize my view about this, do I still agree with the issues that people specifically have for this movie? Some of them to be sure. But honestly, I don't entirely care. In my point of view as a Spider-Man fan, Spidey has gone through much more embarrassing stuff in the past 7 years with things like Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark, Ultimate Spider-Man (at least as far as I know from seeing only a couple of early episodes), having The Lizard look like a goomba from the Super Mario Bros movie in the first Amazing Spider-Man film, and anything you can think of from Spider-Man 3. So while it is sad that Amazing Spider-Man 2 is a major, stuffed mess as both a movie and a story, it's a stuffed mess that is filled with so many good things to love. So because of that, I honestly find the whole deal about it being a mess to be a minor thing for my experience with this film considering how it could've been. I was worried about very different things when it came to this movie, and since this movie didn't really give me a whole lot of them, I feel certain I can live with Amazing Spider-Man 2 being filled with too much stuff as its biggest problem. Heck, the sound effects for Electro are a bigger issue for me than that.
And that's my review for Amazing Spider-Man 2. I have to agree with a good amount of what people say against this film, but I choose to try to not let it get to me that I view those problems over just viewing all the things that where really good. It had great acting, great character development, has a lot of familiar stories from the comics, and a lot of it is done well. It's still a mess when you put all of that great stuff together into one movie, but even with that said, I consider myself as one of the very few who is just happy for what it is, and in some certain aspects, better than the first movie.
Rating: 85%
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