lots of hate for this

Rating: 7/10 (16 April 2014)

I admit I'm not familiar with the story of Spider-Man or the Spider-Man genre. Part of Spider-Man 3 filmed here, and it is amazing how many hundreds and hundreds of people are involved in filming a scene, and we did see how car crashes were accomplished.
That aside, I wasn't aware that there were two Spider-Man franchises, Spider-Man and the Amazing Spider-Man. It seems that The Amazing Spider-Man is loathed by people on this board.
Andrew Garfield stars here as Peter Parker. He's a quiet kid, not a nerd, just a shy kid with a crush on Gwen (Emma Stone), but one who goes about his business. His aunt and uncle are played by Sally Field and Martin Sheen, both excellent. Peter's father (Campbell Scott) and mother leave the boy with the relatives while they disappear. We don't really know what happened to them, despite a newspaper story that says they were killed in a plane crash.
Peter is remarkably intelligent and, after finding his father's old research notes, meets his father's ex-partner, Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans). While nosing around Dr. Connors' lab, Peter becomes Spider-Man when he's bitten by a spider and turns his powers to vigilantism. While experimenting on himself, Dr. Connors goes a bit overboard and turns into a supermutant Lizard. He starts terrorizing New York. It's only a matter of time before Spider-Man and Connors meet.
I guess one franchise, comic books, and a Broadway show aren't enough for Spideyd -- there has to be a second franchise as well. The effects are fantastic, as one would expect, and the cast is good. Besides those mentioned above, Dennis Leary is on hand as the police chief and Gwen's father.
For what it was, it was entertaining. I'd be interested to see some of the Spider-Man franchise to compare the two.