The Amazing Spider-Man

Rating: 6/10 (19 December 2012)

I was very skeptical when I heard that they were not making the next sequel in the Spider-Man saga, but they were starting the whole series together entirely, no more Sam Raimi, Tobey Maguire or Mary Jane Watson, a whole new reboot, supposedly to fit in with a future Avengers Assemble film, but I had to see it, from director Marc Webb (500 Days of Summer). Basically as a child Peter Parker (The Social Network's Andrew Garfield) was abandoned by his parents who went on a business trip with unknown details and never came back when their plane crashed, and he lives as an outcast high school teenager with his Uncle Ben (Martin Sheen) and Aunt May (Sally Field). He is trying to find out more about himself and his parents, and he has crush on beautiful student Gwen Stacy (The Help's Emma Stone) who is going out with bully Flash Thompson (Chris Zylka), and following clues in a suitcase that belonged to his father he goes to the company he worked for, which coincidentally Gwen works at as well. Peter sneaks into pharmaceutical company Oscorp and gets the opportunity also to meet Dr. Curt Connors (Rhys Ifans), who has an arm missing and is trying to develop a cure for terminally ill head of the company, Norman Osborne, and more specifically a serum that can restore limbs, like a lizard when it loses its tail. In the laboratory Peter finds a place his father most likely worked, where genetically enhanced spiders are inside a facility, and looking inside he manages to get himself covered in a bunch of spiders, and brushing most of them off he is unaware of one remaining and he is bitten on the back of the neck. After some time he has gained superhuman abilities such as increased strength, the ability to stick to horizontal and vertical surfaces, super speed, and a heightened sense of danger, and after practising these newfound skills he also finds a formula code of his father's that is key to the serum experiment and eventually creates a successful prototype that restores the missing limb of a three-legged mouse. Returning home Peter has a bad argument with Uncle Ben and Aunt May, and when Ben goes out to look for him he notices a robbery going on at a grocery store, and trying to stop him he ends up being shot and killed by thief, Peter finds him and is too late to save him, so he starts building on his idea, in order to find the guilty man, to create an alter ago. Catching many criminals along the way in vigilante acts one time he sees a poster for a blue and red wrestler, and he gets the idea to create a spandex based suit based on the patterns of a blue and red spider, and he creates wrist canisters to squirt strong biocable strands like the web of a spider, and eventually he reveals he is the vigilante being searched for to Gwen, and they kiss. Rajit Ratha (Irrfan Khan) is demanding after the success with the mouse that the serum should go to human trials immediately, and after initially refusing Dr. Connors tests it on himself hoping to grow back his missing arm, waking up from the affects he is overjoyed to see his arm grown back, but all the sudden a bad side effect reaction occurs and he has turned himself into a giant mutated lizard creature. Connors as this creature, called The Lizard, goes rampaging and finds Ratha on the Williamsburg Bridge where he throws cars over the side, but Peter as the vigilante, eventually calling himself Spider-Man saves the man and many other citizens with his strength and specially developed webbing, but Captain George Stacy (Denis Leary) still sees Spider-Man as some threat. Trying to find the Lizard, who he knows is Dr. Connors, Peter searches the sewers where he retreated with a camera to catch an image of him, but after a fight the Lizard finds out Spider-Man's identity and finds Peter in his Midtown Science High School, and the police meanwhile are on a manhunt for both Spider-Man and the Lizard after this incident. Seeking revenge Dr. Connors intends to disperse his serum all over the city, but Gwen has developed a cure based on Peter's coding discovery, and Captain Stacy discovers Spider-Man's identity also when he is cornered at one point, and he lets him escape to save Gwen trapped in Oscorp, and to replace the serum with the antidote. Before being cured by the antidote Connors returns to human form, but he did manage to mortally wound Captain Stacy, but before he dies Peter promises him he will stay away from Gwen to protect her from any more danger, and he tells Gwen that he cannot see her anymore, but of course Peter admits not all promises can be kept. Also starring Campbell Scott as Richard Parker, Embeth Davidtz as Mary Parker and Stan Lee as School Librarian. British actor Garfield proves to be actually a good choice to be both Peter Parker and the superhero Spider-Man, with his witty personality, maybe not so much naivety and the right amount of humour and moodiness, Stone is nice as the new love interest for the hero, and Ifans is creepy when he becomes the villain of the piece. The origins of Peter Parker and the original comic book version of Spider-Man, where he made his webbing rather than it shooting from his wrists, is suitable, the story has everything connect well, and the action sequences with splendid special effects are engaging, it is not as charming and lacks something that the Sam Raimi version does, but it is an entertaining fantasy adventure. Good!