{"id":23177,"date":"2012-07-13T00:05:46","date_gmt":"2012-07-13T05:05:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christandpopculture.com\/?p=23177"},"modified":"2012-10-04T18:24:05","modified_gmt":"2012-10-05T00:24:05","slug":"the-moviegoer-spider-mans-amazing-but-is-he-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/christandpopculture\/2012\/07\/the-moviegoer-spider-mans-amazing-but-is-he-good\/","title":{"rendered":"The Moviegoer: Spider-Man’s Amazing, but is he Good?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

Each week in\u00a0The Moviegoer<\/a>, Nick Olson examines new and upcoming films.<\/em><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Full disclosure: I haven\u2019t read the comics. Also, I\u2019m going to talk freely. But, let\u2019s be honest, we all know Uncle Ben isn\u2019t going to be in the sequels, right?<\/em><\/p>\n

Midway through Mark Webb\u2019s The Amazing Spider-Man<\/em>, Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) is a dinner guest at his new high school crush Gwen Stacy\u2019s (Emma Stone) home. Gwen\u2019s father, George Stacy (Denis Leary), is a proud police captain who isn\u2019t too fond of a certain web-slinging, crime-fighting vigilante who is the talk of the town. It\u2019s the requisite scene when the police captain is supposed to pipe some ignorance in front of the alter ego. Except, in this scene, Captain Stacy, while certainly making things awkward for Gwen, seems to play the part of muse. He says to Peter that Spider-Man is more concerned with a vendetta than with protecting innocent people. And he\u2019s right. This Peter Parker is more angst-ridden than powerfully responsible. In Webb\u2019s reiteration, the disappearance of Peter\u2019s parents\u2013and the presumed effects that would have on a high schooler\u2013looms larger over the origin story than does the power\/responsibility lesson he\u2019s supposed to learn from his role in Uncle Ben\u2019s death. \u201cWith great power comes great responsibility\u201d isn\u2019t shelved. It\u2019s delayed\u2013made complicated.<\/p>\n

The best way to describe the essential difference between the first film in the latest Spidey trilogy to the beginning of its predecessor is to say that Mark Webb\u2019s The Amazing Spider-Man <\/em>ends where Sam Raimi\u2019s Spider-Man <\/em>begins. \u201cWho am I<\/em>?<\/em>\u201d Tobey Maguire\u2019s Peter Parker wonders aloud in the film\u2019s first line. It\u2019s the question that Webb\u2019s film ends with. Peter\u2019s still in high school, still unsure of who he is. Allowing this identity question to hang in the air is, presumably, how Webb intends to give his trilogy a darker shade. And, at least when compared to Raimi\u2019s trilogy, his film achieves that tone for the most part, while maintaining its quintessential spidey-sense for charm.<\/p>\n

Allowing this identity question to hang in the air at the conclusion of an origin story is a bold move, though. And it\u2019s one that many devoted Spidey fans are not too fond of. One of my favorite critics, Steven D. Greydanus, also happens to be a big fan of Spider-man, and he\u2019s less than enthused<\/a> about Webb\u2019s take:<\/p>\n

Peter\u2019s response to his uncle\u2019s murder \u2014 the key turning point in the character\u2019s development \u2014 is completely wrong. Instead of blaming himself, or resolving to use his powers to protect others, he directs all his wrath against the murderer, leading to an extended manhunt as Peter tracks down thugs who fit the general description of his uncle\u2019s killer while showing no interest in other criminals.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not against giving Peter a longer learning curve. I get that Peter\u2019s vendetta against his uncle\u2019s killer parallels his earlier retaliation against high-school bully Flash Thompson (Chris Zylka), over which Uncle Ben himself rebuked Peter. The problem is that the movie never<\/em> gets where it needs to: At no time does the lesson of power and responsibility emerge in connection with Ben\u2019s death.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Steven\u2019s right about how the film handles Peter\u2019s response to Uncle Ben\u2019s death, and, as I mentioned, he\u2019s right that the film closes without this narrative thread tied.\u00a0 Yet, while it\u2019s understandable why some fans might have a problem with the origin story not establishing Spider-man\u2019s essential identity by the end of the first film, the move seemed so purposeful that I\u2019m willing to hold out hope that Webb intends to tidy things up, maybe even have his immature Peter reflectively return to the tragic scene at some pivotal point in the sequel. It\u2019s telling the way Uncle Ben frames the issue in a final reprimand just before he dies: it\u2019s not about choice<\/em>, it\u2019s about responsibility. That personal choice is our culture\u2019s highest good\u2013superseding moral obligations on our ethical hierarchy\u2013is no secret. And so count me interested in Webb\u2019s revisionist twist for this reason. <\/em><\/p>\n

But there\u2019s enough reasons for any praise to be qualified, too. The fact is I did feel some too-soon-for-a-reboot fatigue during the film. It was a given that some of the origin story narrative points were going to be similar, but I don\u2019t know if they needed to be so <\/em>similar. Only five years removed from Raimi, Webb needed to be more committed to differentiating himself. I\u2019m not asking that the essential narrative turns of the origin story be changed\u2013not at all\u2013but I at least wanted more inventiveness with its delivery. For all of the ways that this film distinguished itself, I still had moments of retread-induced ennui. Another issue is that while Webb\u2019s distinctiveness was mostly a positive in the film, he also needed to get out of his own way at certain points. I\u2019ll only mention that the Coldplay song works at first, but then feels tonally adrift by the time Peter is skating around checking out his powers. It was a scene killer. And, look, one person\u2019s unbearably cheesy is another person\u2019s delightfully campy, but any of the scenes involving sports were . . . pretty difficult.<\/p>\n

So what worked? According to the source material (I\u2019m told), Gwen is Peter\u2019s first love\u2013even before Mary Jane. And for me, the relationship that unfolds between the two is the highlight of the film. Garfield and Stone are strong leads with undeniable chemistry. Stone\u2019s Gwen has a sharp\u00a0 assertiveness about her that is, in a way, a welcome reprieve from Kirsten Dunst\u2019s Mary Jane. Peter and Gwen\u2019s (almost) young adult relationship is less characteristic of Twilight <\/em>tween romance than it is of Webb\u2019s first feature release, (500) Days of<\/em> Summer<\/em>. The relationship has an energetic, magnetic quirk about it that the director and his two leads seem poised to grow on. I\u2019m interested in seeing how this now-forbidden relationship unfolds.<\/p>\n

Webb also puts his stylistic stamp on the film in a good way when we first see Peter awaken to his spidey-sense on the subway. The way Webb conveys Peter\u2019s newfound sensibility to the audience, coupled with the young hero\u2019s self-deprecating apologies\u00a0 as he humorously tries to come to grips with himself, makes the scene really work. Further, the 3D serves the web-swinging well; in fact, I wouldn\u2019t have been bothered to have more of it from the first-person point of view. The effect provided moments of thrill that only seemed to vanish too soon. And Webb shows himself perfectly capable of delivering the type of fun that is characteristic of the series in a battle between Spider-man and the Lizard in Peter\u2019s high school. Three moments\u2013a scene with Stan Lee\u2019s necessary cameo, Peter\u2019s use of web to tactically evade and tie up the Lizard, and then his quip to Gwen that he\u2019s going to \u201cthrow her out the window\u201d\u2013collectively work together in a way that revitalizes appreciation for the reboot.<\/p>\n

For most of the movie, Peter keeps forgetting to get Aunt May the eggs she needs\u2013even after Uncle Ben is killed. It\u2019s supposed to be a representative forgetfulness. This is a high schooler who is still haunted by the sudden abandonment of his parents, still wrestling with his Uncle\u2019s death and his role in it, still . . . too self-conscious to be unambiguously good<\/em>. It\u2019s why, when Aunt May says near the end of the film that \u201cif there\u2019s one thing Peter is, it\u2019s good,\u201d it hangs in the air like a question, with a touch of irony. Is he?<\/em> And Webb makes the point even clearer by concluding, smartly, with his two leads in the classroom. Will Peter heed Captain Stacy\u2019s demand to stay away from his daughter? Or are \u201cbroken promises the best kind?\u201d It\u2019s a tangled web that Peter\u2019s weaving. That responsibility remains a question for Webb\u2019s Spider-man just might be this trilogy\u2019s most formidable foe\u2013and Webb\u2019s slickest trick.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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