Spiderman 3 review, gawd yes another one

Tweet

Well considering the flourish of reviews I thought one more couldn't hurt. To give you a quick perspective I am an old time fan of Spidey, reading the comics since the 1960s. Love superhero movies. Still a partial kid at 47. Well Spiderman 3 the juggernaut hit theatres this weekend setting a new record at theatres with over 150 million in North American box office. The old record was held by Pirates of the Caribbean. No big surprise considering the huge buildup for Spiderman 3, but will it hold? Is the story strong enough to bring back the repeat business critical to go beyond the two week window for movies? -----Some minor spoilers ahead------- Sadly I don't think it is. To me this was more of a Sam. Raimi movie than a Spiderman movie. Too many villains spoiled the broth and didn't allow for any of them to develop. This results in absolutely cardboard villains, especially Sandman (the daughter angle was very weakly portrayed). Venom loses much of his punch because Raimi decided to have Brock do all the talking. There is worse than the limp villains though. The Peter-Mary Jane romance does its one step forward, two steps back. Why was Gwen Stacy even in the movie? And what was Raimi thinking with the Spiderman and the key to the city silliness? Geez anyone who has listened to the theme song from the 60s knows that this is wrong. And Peter's "Saturday Night Fever" strut was just painful. There are some problems with the special effects but mostly nit-picky stuff. They have really gotten great at portraying spider-man's abilities, and the action scenes can be dazzling. I didn't care for the way they had Sandman use his power but it was still good. The end leaves it wide open for another movie. I kind of hope they go to a new director and cast if they do. I don't think the people involved now have anything left to give to the franchise and its time for some fresh ideas. Overall grade is a solid B. I won't see it twice but well worth one watch, it is a Spiderman movie after all. And that gets me in the door alone.