Shocking!

Rating: 4/10 (4 May 2007)

What is there to say about this movie? After the light-hearted yet great action-packed first two movies, what were we to expect for the third movie? Apparently the movie was marketed as the "darkest" of the three, seemed to promise more action, especially when combining three villains from the comic books.
But as a loyal fan, I went to the theater to see the movie. Bought the tickets multiple days in advance and waited to see what has been hyped up for so long. And the reviews and critics were right. The movie tries to do too much and in the end disappoints.
First, the movie fails to fully introduce any of the new characters, and for most of the first half is quite scatter brained and moves from sequence to sequence, failing to bring any of these stories really together.
Despite the poor development, the worst part of the movie was the cheesiness. Yes, we all know this is a comic adaptation. Yes, we all know comic books are cheesy. But not to this extent. For moments, I had actually believed we were sitting in the wrong theater, watching some horrible chick flick. There were moments in the movie that seemed out of ordinary, random, like chosen scenes from SNL making parodies of itself. As funny as this may sound, it made it difficult to continue watching the movie. We were constantly reminded of Tobey Maguire and James Franco's inexperience as actors. Neither of whom could pull of the cheesiness or light-hearted fun.
The movie writers completely moved away from what the first two movies set up. And even worse, they deceived the movie-goer with the trailers. You enter the theater expecting more action, some darker events, but perhaps the same light-hearted comic book fun. Yet, you get less action, less plot development, "dark" events that are impossible to take seriously and will just laugh at instead, and over-sapped cheesiness that puts "Scary Movie," "Not Another Teen Movie," and "Can't Hardly Wait" to shame. For a movie that was portrayed in the trailers as "the darkest of the three," it earned the most laughters, mockeries, disappointments and walk-outs I've seen in a Spiderman screening.
It was honestly difficult to sit through this movie. I am a comic book junky, and even for me, it was nearly unbearable. Very disappointed in the way they chose to finish the series.