The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014)

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nTitle: The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014)

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nDirector: Marc Webb

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nCast: Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Jamie Foxx, Dane DeHaan,nSally Field, Paul Giamatti

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nThe Amazing Spiderman 2 was a great way to kick start the 2014nSummer Blockbuster Season; the season that many film buffs such as myself looknforward to because it’s that time of the year when the biggest most bombasticnfilms are unleashed. These films are meant to wow us, they are meant to be hugenspectacles, and I have to say that The Amazing Spiderman 2 certainly falls intonthat category. Many moments during the film had me saying “amazing!”  out loud; so I think it’s safe to say thenmovie delivers where it’s supposed to deliver. What was so good about ThenAmazing Spiderman 2? And where did it fail?

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nThis time around, Spiderman is having a great time beingnSpidey, saving the world, helping kids fight bullies, saving the world fromnrampaging villains, but he still has one dilemma, his promise to Gwen Stacy’snfather before he died. If you remember correctly, fearing for his daughter’snlife, Captain Stacy made Peter Parker promise him that he would leave GwennStacy out of his life.  So anyways,nSpiderman tries to leave Gwen alone, but their attraction is too strong. At thensame time, two villains are born: Electro and The Green Goblin, both of whomnwant Spidey dead, for their own respective reasons. Can Spider-Man be a heronand be in love at the same time?

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nI didn’t exactly love the first Amazing Spiderman movie. Mynbig problem with it was the cgi; I didn’t really dig it. It made characters lookntoo much like a cartoon, not real enough. This problem was especially evidentnwhenever The Lizard appeared. I felt I was looking at some crappy cartoon. Notnconvincing in my book. The problem with a lot of these Spiderman movies hasnalways been the CGI, which in my book has always been spotty. I was watchingnSpider-Man 3 (2007) the other day and boy, the CGI on that one was so obviouslynCGI, and when that happens, the film loses its grip on reality and falls apartnin my book. And this is where this second film got things right, the CGI wasnexcellent. When we follow Spidey as he swings through the city, well, he looksnreal enough in my book, you can see the ripples in his freaking suit, you hearnthe wind. An effort is made to make things convincing.

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nI was worried about the amount of villains, because notnevery director can handle a lot of villains properly, sometimes the end resultnis a Batman & Robin (1997) type of deal, where we have a bunch of villainsnand none of them are developed properly or treated with any dignity, the endnresult is a bunch of paper thin villains that aren’t brought to life in a satisfyingnway. The best example I can think of is Bane in Batman and Robin, and Venom in Spider-Mann3; both terrible renditions of important villains because both films where clutterednwith way too many villains. Thankfully this doesn’t happen in The AmazingnSpider-Man 2. For all intents and purposes this is Electro’s film and he looksnand sounds kick ass. I loved the visual with all the blue fluorescent lightningnbolts, it just looked freaking sweet. Mix that with the electric bass soundnthey put whenever Electro appears and we have a perfect marriage of sight andnsound, the visuals and the sounds mixed like magic. The Green Goblinsntransformation was awesome…but I’m not entirely sure I love his overall look.nIn my book he still needs to be more monstrous, more demonic, like in thencomics. Then we have The Rhino, but thankfully he is only used as a tease fornthe next film, which apparently will feature The Sinister Six, an amalgamationnof some of Spidey’s deadliest villains.

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nThe film did a fine balancing act between story, romance,nkick ass action and mind blowing effects. In some ways it reminded me a bit ofnStar Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones (2002) because it had that thingnwhere it went from romance, to action, then back to romance, then back tonaction again and so forth. Final words are that I can’t really bring myself tonsay anything bad about this movie. The only thing I can say didn’t really fitninto the film was the tacked on “extra ending” with a scene that leads into X-men:nDays of Future Past (2014), which will be premiering in the next couple ofnmonths. My problem with that scene was that it wasn’t even that good; it wasn’tna real grabber. And on top of that, it had absolutely nothing to do with ThenAmazing Spider-Man films. I would have preferred an extra ending that connectednwith The Amazing Spider-Man 3. But alas, it felt like a cheap way to promotenX-Men: Days of Future Past. So yeah, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was a step upnfrom the first film, I recommend it if you want to start the 2014 Summer Seasonnwith a blast!

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nRating: 4 out of 5 

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