Congratulations, Mr. Raimi and Tristar... you've made the WORST MOVIE EVER!!!!!

Rating: 1/10 (14 August 2003)

Okay, to be honest, I am a big Spider-man fan. I'd grab all of the comics, watch the cartoon on Saturdays, buy the toys..... heck, I even stuck through the clone mess, the reboot nightmare, and worst of all, Paul Jenkins's Peter Parker Spider-man #21(at least he got better at writing Spidey stories). But after the decision to cast Kirsten Dunst, an actress I detest with all my heart, as Mary Jane Watson, and seeing the stupid costume they designed for the Green Goblin(which, in the song "Ode to A Superhero," Weird Al Yankovic named it the equivalent of a Power Rangers costume), I had my doubts. A lot of doubts. This didn't help when I saw the teaser(Let's go for the Ultimate Spin? Kill me now). But still, after the opening weekend, I reluctantly decided to see it, hoping that it would be good and I'd be wrong, since I did like the comic adaption(but then again, it was written by Stan Lee, a person who can actually WRITE). And so, I went inside the movie theater.
Sadly, my hopeful expectations were shot as fatally as poor Uncle Ben.
The film, simply put, is HORRIBLE. The acting is some of the worst I have ever seen in my life. The opening scene at the science lab was so bad, I wanted to vomit. By the time Peter is figuring out his powers, I actually couldn't take any more and tried to leave the movie theater, but one of my friends forced me to stay. Spider-man's character is also downplayed. We only have the serious wall-crawler from some of Stan Lee's more serious issues, but we never get to see the lighter side. Spider-man doesn't even make one of his trademark wisecracks that we all know and love the entire film(something pivotal to the character. Just read the story, "The Best Medicine," in PPSM#20, and you'll see what I mean). This humorless character pretty much just spends the entire time complaining. Add to the fact that there is NO chemistry between Peter/Spidey and MJ in the film, and you have another reason to hate this.
SPOILERS IN THE NEXT PARAGRAPH
Right after the wrestling scene, when the guy hands Peter his money, we see that Peter ISN'T wearing that shoddy face-mask from earlier. So doesn't this guy know that he's Spider-man? I mean, Peter shows up and beats up the wrestler with his SPIDER powers, and now some guy dressed in a red and blue costume calling himself Spider-man shows up? This guy could find out who he is now, unless he's too stupid to make the obvious connection! All he has to do is learn his name.... oh, but if Peter goes on and sells photos to the Daily Bugle, wouldn't it have a "photos taken by Peter Parker," or something like that? This plot hole just serves to show how little the writers were thinking when they created this nightmare. Also, Aunt May's "Superman," line is so awful it shows how low some script-writers can get when they try to inject some humor.
END SPOILERS
Danny Elfman once again creates a forgettable score, similar to Hulk,(this is the guy who once composed stuff for Simpsons, Batman, and Men In Black!?), which doesn't really affect the mood of the film. And the CGI is just plain bad. It is so obvious whenever you see a CGI Spider-man instead of Tobey Maguire. Raimi really needs to work here if he wants to clean up this mess in time for the sequel.... but I doubt he will.
BOTTOM LINE: The ultimate piece of trash. Someone needs to boycott the sequel.