Tedious, overblown, boring sequel

Rating: 1/10 (29 October 2009)

MORE and BIGGER is not necessarily BETTER! I actually enjoyed the first SPIDERMAN (2002) with its simple, focused story of Peter Parker (played soundly and solidly by Tobey Maguire) bitten by a radioactive spider and discovering that he had unusual abilities to shoot webs from his wrists, scale buildings, and sense things! The characters were fresh and interesting, the villain (Green Goblin) was cool and the film moved at a leisurely pace.
Here comes the sequel SPIDERMAN 2 (2004)! And OF COURSE the masses fall for all the hype, the multitude of characters, the longer running time, etc! But this flick is just plain BORING! In SPIDERMAN, the filmmakers so eloquently and effectively showed us Peter Parker's pain and shock as his selfishness inadvertently led to his uncle's death. THEN, they had to try to one-up themselves by having a super sad, annoying scene in SPIDEY 2 where Peter (again played by Maguire) tells his aunt that he was responsible. That scene was Hollywood Manipulation 101! The point of the first one was that Peter was a kid (a high schooler for cripe's sake!) with no goals, no direction, no maturity. And I hated his aunt's reaction. To shun him like that for not getting involved in what was rightfully a police matter. Last time I looked, Spiderman was not impervious to bullets! He could have been killed. Did not fool me with that one!
Also, the object of Peter's affection...Miss Mary Jane Rotten Bottom (Kirsten Dunst)...is a WHORE! That's right, a SLUT! She went from Harry Osborn (James Franco), who was just using her to get back at Peter in SPIDERMAN to Jameson's nephew (or son or whatever) in this movie. So she goes from Peter's best friend to Peter's boss's son (or nephew or whatever). THIS easy chick is the object of his desire?
And that J.K. Simmons as Jameson is annoying as heck and NOT funny... and he's the comic relief! More like comic refuse! And there's the obligatory population of useless extras who add NOTHING to the proceedings but to scream and screech and be wowed by Spidey's abilities...It's a bird, it's a plane, it's Spiderloser!
And they had this one scene where Harry slaps Peter at a party in front of a bunch of people...What? And Peter just stood there and took it! I'd have taken my chances with the spoiled millionaire and hit his tail back! Or at least sued him! May be a hero, but Peter's still a MAN! This sleaze basically stole the woman meant to be your girlfriend in the first movie and you let him get away with this? C'mon, Petey!
But the biggest travesty was this part where Peter temporarily loses his powers and have this extended sequence where Peter is blissfully free and human again and they play RAINDROPS KEEP FALLIN ON MY HEAD!...I repeat...they play RAINDROPS KEEP FALLIN ON MY HEAD! Reason #1 any human being can say this film sucks!
Of course, there is the perfunctory special effects extravaganza! But it's all show and is much too hard to believe. The villain is Dr. Ock (Alfred Molina), who's ticked about something (aren't they all?) so he plans revenge on the city of, New York, is it? At least this is New York as New York and not Chicago as Gotham City! See the multi-armed CGI villain octopus his way through New York...see Spidey shoot webs endless webs miles and miles...see Peter pine for Mary Jane...see Mary Jane act like a mindless idiot for not knowing this guy is obsessed with her ass...YAWN!