A too hurried reinvention of Spiderman that pales compared to the previous trilogy

Rating: 5/10 (5 November 2012)

I enjoyed Spiderman and Spiderman 2 very much, and think they deserve a little higher rating here on IMDb. They had good story line, well done acting, good action sequences (especially the second movie) and the good mixture of drama, love and action that I associate with a classic superhero movie. You may complain that it's a little too conservative in style, not daring to take new leaps, but the director did however succeed in making the very best of that kind of movie.
When I first heard about a new movie I was skeptical since I think that the "old" movies are still keeping up in quality to this date. I got that usual feeling about Hollywood making the best to make more money, adding nothing to already good movies but some new visual effects and new actors. However I saw that the movie had a quite OK ranking of 7.4 on IMDb and that critic reviews were not too bad in my home country so I decided to give it a chance.
The movie however, turned out to be as much of a success that I first expected. In this version Peter Parker is much more of a careless average teen riding his skateboard and going to school, and we don't get a chance to start feeling any sympathy or care for him while his personality and relationship to other characters are not developed at all. At times it feels like watching a commercial version of Spiderman where everything is happening too fast.
Spidermans love interest follows the same fate as Spiderman himself, lacking any problems as well as personality. One of the great accomplishments in Spiderman & Spiderman 2 was that they managed to make the antagonists into characters you at least could relate to in a certain degree, and then turning them into monsters in a somewhat believable way (for a superhero movie). Here we have a very nicely behaved and boring scientist that turns into something as original and fascinating as a giant lizard... Well, this is a superhero movie and you should not expect seriously deep characters with truly complex relations (those didn't exist in the previous installments either), but I still expect a Spiderman you could get into as an adult and not a movie with acting more like a regular high school movie.
Also, the problem with being Spiderman and at the same time living a life as Peter Parker has to a much higher degree turned into moral lessons about helping your family in the household, one more thing that makes the movie feel more suitable for younger viewers.
The action sequences is quite OK actually and doesn't lack anything special, but the movie won't be remembered for them either.
The only thing that really is improved is the visuals, with some cool sequences when we see the world as Spiderman when he flies between the skyscrapers. However, with all improved special effects I think the movie is a little too bold as it starts to feel like they are there only for their own sake and not supporting the movie. In a movie like this I prefer special effects for their requirement and not as standalone attractions.
In the end this was merely OK for a standalone movie. Nothing was all terrible (maybe besides a few really cheesy things such as the skateboard scene and the girl wanting Parker to take pictures of her boyfriends car) but the movie suffers from being inferior to the previous installments, while still reminding them a lot. Trying to refresh Spiderman with a new movie right now doesn't only sound bad on paper; it was a failed attempt.