Ten years later...

Rating: 10/10 (2 August 2014)

This is absolutely fantastic. This isn't just a sequel that was just as good as the first, it whooped the first movie so hard and it set the bar extremely high for future superhero movies and movies in general to come. Toby Maguire, Alfred Molina, James Franco, Rosemary Harris and extras play their roles wonderfully. Kirsten Dunst not so much.The characters have matured and you'll care for these characters. The story is much deeper and the stakes are higher than they wee in the first film.
2 years after the first movie, Peter is suffering to balance his normal life and his crime fighting life. He's low on pay, he doesn't make time for Harry or Mary Jane, Peter is doing poorly in school, he doesn't want to feel this pain anymore. He meets Doc Ock, a scientist invested in his work, but when his experiment goes bad and kills his wife, he avenges her and swears to take down Spider-Man and all of New York by rebuilding his work, but bigger and stronger than ever. Now, Peter has to stand up and do what's right.
The action in this movie is just perfect. Not too boring and not too intense. The CGI looks really amazing for 2004 and it hasn't aged yet. I love the fight on the clock tower and on top of the train. Although I did enjoy Danny Elfman's work in the first Spider-Man, he brings his A game to the sequel and it's fantastic. The music is calm, ambient, sad, and frantic when it appropriately needs to be. This is personally my favorite film score. It's just a shame that Elfman had an uncomfortable time composing for the movie.
Quoting from the film critic Roger Ebert who didn't enjoy the first Sam Raimi Spider-Man that much, he said that Spider-Man 2 "May be the best superhero movie I have ever seen." If you have not seen Spider-Man 2, go and watch this. You are doing a massive disservice to yourself by missing out on a compelling story and spectacular fight sequences. 10 years later and I still love this movie so much. This is a special movie, one of my top 10 favorite movies ever. This will go down in the film history books.