A weak but fairly entertaining sequel

Rating: 6/10 (15 March 2019)

Despite lingering doubts about the necessity of a reboot, the Amazing Spider Man was a resounding success and it was inevitable that a sequel would follow. Well now it's here, and it's a fun movie that will please a lot of audiences, but it's not as good as it could have been or as the last movie was. This is not to say that ASM 2 is another Spider Man 3, which was itself not as terrible as a lot of people remember it being. ASM 2 has great acting and heart pumping action, and at no point does it induce cringes or bad laughter, it's just that it tries to do more than it should and not all the pieces fit together perfectly.
This installment picks up roughly where the last left off, with Peter fighting crime as Spider Man while struggling to choose between his love for Gwen Stacy and his promise to her dying father. Unanswered questions still linger about his parents as well, and but it's developments within Oscorp that pose the greatest threat as a freak accident turns mild mannered underdog Maxwell Dillon into the powerful villain Electro and Harry Osborn's search for a cure to the disease which killed his father drives him in increasingly dark directions.
The movie's strong point is its acting. Despite being a Brit, James Garfield perfectly fits the role of goofy all American teenager Peter Parker. He's more than a bit nerdy, often awkward, and spouts quips and cheesy one liners like a pro. Leading lady Emma Stone is just as good. Plucky, intelligent, and undeniably cute, she makes the perfect sidekick/love interest for Peter. Buoyed by the exceptional chemistry befitting their real life relationship, their scenes together make for one of the better on screen teen romances of recent years, and it would have been nice if this element had been played up more.
The bad guys also make quite the impression. Jamie Fox seems like an odd choice to play Electro, but he works. As Maxwell Dillon he's so pathetic, so earnest, so downtrodden at every turn that you can't help feel sorry for him. But when he decides that he's had enough of being kicked around and gains the power to do something about it, he gets downright scary. Dane DeHaan also puts in good work as Harry Osborn. Not as charismatic or as versatile as James Franco was, he nonetheless is more brooding, calculating, and borderline obsessive, making him a more convincing Goblin.
Now for the bad. The main problem with the movie is that there are simply too many characters and subplots. Most of plot threads are well written and contribute to the main narrative, but together they give the runtime a cluttered feel and the transitions between them are often somewhat rough. The start- or perhaps I should say resumption- of Peter's search for the truth about his parent's death is particularly abrupt and oddly timed. At times the plot also relies on characters making incredibly stupid decisions, but given their circumstances I suppose their choices are plausible.
Now I'm afraid I can't continue any further without getting into spoiler territory, so consider yourself warned. Fans have known that it was only a matter of time until Gwen Stacy died tragically, and this is that time. Her death, at the hands of the Green Goblin of course- was well handled, the modest changes to the circumstances taking nothing away from its impact. Yet I can't help shake the feeling that in a movie featuring her famous death scene, it should be the main villain who kills her. Her death should be the climax of Spider Man's last fight with the Green Goblin, not the first. I just hope the filmmakers will use this as the basis of a bitter feud with the Goblin.
While the movie has a very good ending, it fails to recognize it as such and continues with another fifteen minutes of material that would have been better left to the first act of the next movie. Despite its very real and sometimes serious faults, I still mostly enjoyed Amazing Spider Man 2 and wouldn't have minded another instalment. Overall it's not the home run its predecessor was, but as a fun summer action movie it mostly works.