Spiderman 3 fails to carry the depth of first two films

Rating: 6/10 (5 May 2007)

Lacking the originality and simple character-driven story arcs that made the first two Spiderman films such brilliant works of movie-making, Sam Raimi has chosen instead to over-populate his film in the Schumaker Batman franchise style with a cornucopia of overlapping ideas that fail to make us care for anyone.
The film introduces to a strong set of characters, each with the ability of taking the Spiderman series to new heights of emotional and visual depth possibly never seen in this type of film. The battle sequences between Harry and Peter are brilliant works of tragedy, filled with betrayals and heart-breaking moments. The Sandman's story is in many ways a strong attempt to bring Valjean's plight to the 21st Century. And in the final villain(s), we have the greatest foe anyone could possibly face. Pure evil, fueled by unwarranted revenge, with savagery and monstrosity that is unstoppable and undestroyable. These worlds were set-up in this film, but never deliver. The convoluted plot is only strong when it revolves around Peter Parker trying to exist in the world (a point that is also true of the other two films), and here we are given the chance for things to turn truly ugly as the Black costume alters Peter's view of the world. We are given one truly dark moment as a result of the costume, which instantly opens our heroes mind. No turmoil, no real battle within. To make matters worse, we don't even get to see the black suit in action except for one battle sequence.
Spiderman's greatest foe is a side note, a boring character with no real drive who does nothing actually evil. Shoved in as a last thought, Raimi and his writers chose to ignore the possibility of creating a New York afraid of Spiderman as Venom is mistaken for our webbed hero. Brock's love interest opens more dark possibilities for truly terrible things to happen that never do. There are no struggles, no gains, no real battles in this film.