Amazing?

Rating: 5/10 (16 April 2014)

So I just got back from watching The Amz S-M 2, and here are my thoughts. I read many professional reviews off websites and many felt pretty harsh and that had me doubting my opinion; whether I watched a good movie or a bad one. But I think what I saw was pretty good. It's still too early to fully access it and my opinion may change. This movie isn't perfect though, any problems people have with this movie are completely justified but because I love Spider-Man I can looks past that (just).
The first movie was mixed, I didn't feel like re-doing the origin was necessary at all. For me, that's playing it safe. Origins are easy stories to tell and it was already told in the Raimi films. But now that Spider-Man is already established this was going to be the most important film as you get to see whether they can tell a good original story.
One thing they tried with the first film to separate it from the Raimi films was involving Peters parents. But this storyline was never followed through thoroughly. I know they wanted to continue this arc for future sequels but it never felt satisfying enough to me. It felt like a gimmick almost. Now, we get a bit more information regarding the late Parker's, the movie opens with them once again and their presence is felt in a few more scenes. To me it feels like the people working on this movie dug themselves a hole, now that they've mentioned the Parkers in movie one, they've had no choice but to follow through with their story or else the first film with them would've been pointless.
Andrew Garfield is back as Spider-Man and he's as cocky and overconfident as ever, some people may take that as an unlike-able quality, but I enjoyed him and his performance. So there were three villains this time around, you could say: "have they not learned from Spider-Man 3" but if they are building towards having a Sinister Six, do you really want there to be six films for each villain and a seventh for all of them? Audiences need to understand you can't have it both ways.
What did I think of the villains though? Rhino I didn't like, if you have seen the trailers then that's pretty much all the screen time he has. There were a couple action shots and that was it. Paul Giamatti overacted the character and was just plain silly. There was another character in the movie, Dr. Kafka. He was just another complete idiot. I must say, I was impressed with the Rhinos design. When I first saw the poster shot, I was thinking: "What the f@#k am I looking at? But he translated well and was a faithful adaptation to Bendis and Bagleys Ultimate Rhino which I'm glad they went with, a mainstream Rhino suit would have looked ridiculous.
Electro? He was mixed for me, in the comics he has little depth to his character, so any actor playing him would have been limited to begin with but I thought Foxx was good. Honestly though anyone could have played him. As Max Dillion (Electro's alter ego) Jamie was pretty funny he was different to other incarnations of the character. A lot of people will compare him to the Riddler and Syndrome and that's fair enough. Electro does have the best action scenes they are truly spectacular. But his suit was horrible, it looked like something out of Prometheus. Like Rhino, going mainstream with the suit would have looked silly, but could they have still gotten something fans are familiar with? F@#king hell. Some of the dialogue was pretty cringe-worthy to listen to. I think one line Electro is like: "It's my birthday, time to light my candles" or some sh!t.
Lastly was Green Goblin, easily my favourite villain of the three. He was well acted, I'm glad they went with Dehaan. If you've seen him in Chronicle you'll know what I'm talking about. The final confrontation between him and Spider-Man was very intense I could feel my heart beating during those scenes.
I also feel like I also have myself to blame, I watched too much movie footage and spoiled myself. I was over hyped and had unfair expectations invested into the movie. But I am reviewing this as a fan, not some critic who looks at plot devices. So what did I like? Peter and Gwen had great chemistry and there was some spectacular action scenes. What did I hate? Some of the music choices was just... f@#king bizarre, an example of this was during Times Square. Electro's staring at the screens and there is just this dumb stock music playing. I also think Rhino and Electro could have been handled better and the dialogue could have been sharper.
There was some really strange scenes; there was a montage of Spider-Mans heroics. After each battle you see Spider-Man throwing his costume in the closet and one time he's carrying a fish, what the f@#k? It's just a really weird movie sometimes.
Anyway, good movie, I'm giving it ten stars because of how much love Spider-Man even though this movie may really being like a 7-8 (which is still a great score btw.)