Excellent. (Spoilers)

Rating: 9/10 (3 July 2004)

The original movie was good - fun, silly in the right places, decent action.
But, for all of that, I always felt the original movie was more about the Green Goblin than Spidey. However, it was a nice, tight package that, had it not performed as well as it had wouldn't need a sequel.
However, it did do well, and now we have a sequel. And this one is different. So very different.
Not only does Raimi up the camp level (Peter acting out a day to "Raindrops Keep Fallin' on my Head," in hilarious nod to "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid") in order to give us some humor in a movie that, frankly, is not going to be dealing with funny issues: Harry's drinking himself to ruin, obsessed with finding his father's "killer;" MJ is not content with waiting for Peter and, to add insult to injury, she's going to marry JJ's son; Aunt May's house is going to be foreclosed on; Octavious's miscalculated experiment, one that will benefit everyone on the planet, has led to the death of his wife and his being driven mad when the tentacles fuse; and, finally, Peter can't reliably bring in money, is in danger of failing his classes, and is seriously second-guessing himself because of things happening around him.
Spidey has always been the most human of superheroes. I remember, when I was a kid, reading a storyline in the comics with Dr. Ock and Spidey have it out on the rooftops and Spidey has a serious cold, has lost his mask and is wearing a cheap, costume store version (with, mind you, no lenses, so his eyes are visible) that he can't breathe through. All he really wanted to do was crawl back into bed and rest... but Ock wasn't going to go away until Spidey makes him.
Thus, this movie is about the one issue that we all have to deal with in life: power and responsibility go hand-in-hand. You cannot have one without the other, and Peter has to learn that in this movie. And he does. The movie's main theme is that, sometimes, you have to let go of your dreams. Eventually, you have to be an adult and admit that you can't have it all. No one is saying they like it, but that is life - even for a superhero.
The performances in the movie are strong, even Kirsten Dunst's (I've seen some complaints about her recently). Dunst plays MJ the way she has to be played: early 20's, wants Peter but is constantly put off by him, so she isn't going to wait... or is she? The bewilderment we see from MJ, that does become resolve by the end of the movie, is understandable and needed. Harry's decent into madness is impressive... so much so that I almost didn't need him to see Norman at the end of the movie (but that was an excellent touch and a nice cameo to tie to two movies almost perfectly). Octavious, with Molina having to act as both Otto and the tentacles' AI, makes so much sense. He was an excellent choice for the character.
As for the plot construction of the movie: it very clearly set up as the second movie of a trilogy. That's why the end is anti-climatic - because this storyline is not over. As MJ watches Spidey swing off to save the day at the end of the movie, I remembered Luke and Leia watching the Millennium Falcon take off at the end of ESB. The audience knows of a lurking menace (Harry finding his father's Green Goblin stash hearkening the Hobgoblin in the next movie), and the secret of who Spidey is is out to MJ and Harry. Of course, we've now seen Curt Connors ( who, in the comics, is the Lizard) on screen, and John Jameson (again, in the comics, is the Man-Wolf), so the set-up for the next movie is clear: Spidey will have to defend himself against Harry. He will have to use all of his power to do it... and there could be two other villains floating around in the background.