Age of The Nerd
A teaser for the upcoming Spiderman: Homecoming trailer has been released hinting at an upgrade for our web slinging hero. Spiderman: Homecoming will be the sixth Spiderman film to be released since Sam Raimi’s original released back in 2002. It went on to spawn two more sequels eventually resulting in a reboot and yet another continuation that ultimately flopped.
Spiderman: Homecoming looks to be bringing back some of the humour and fun that the character was always meant to bring to its audience despite the fact that he is now incorporated into Marvel’s extended universe. Of course, we’ll have to definitely see if the movie ends up being as good as the hype is promising it to be. Time will tell.
Today, this editorial is going to attempt to rank each Spiderman film released so far from worst to best. Let us know if you agree or disagree in the comments!
The Amazing Spider-Man (2012)
Andrew Garfield took over the role that had been Tobey Maguire’s for half a decade, and while there was not anything particularly wrong with his performance, the writing was pretty substandard and it’s attempt at humour was almost farcical at times. Contradiction also disturbed character development. Since when does a bullied nerd have the audacity to break into a high security laboratory?
The action sequences also fell short of producing something fresh and the whole experience felt underwhelming for a reboot that promised to elevate the franchise out of the mess that Spiderman 3 got itself into.
The Amazing Spider-man 2 (2014)
The most recent Spider-man picture to date, this sequel was only a marginal improvement over it’s predecessor despite the shocking ending. Action scenes, however, were spoiled by corny slow motion editing and even freeze frame! Some odd choices were definitely made in order to give us more of an insight into how Spiderman does his thing. But it all leaves you thinking of that old adage that sometimes you are best off not knowing. Besides the action, the story and drama regarding Peter’s personal life failed to resonate at all.
Let us all hope that they have something that is going to be memorable for us in the next reboot!
Spider-man 3 (2007)
Reshoots, stunts that went wrong, a nearly three year long shooting schedule, recycled elements from Spiderman 2…..well, we get the picture. And yes, they actually used some of Kirsten Dunst’s screams from Spiderman 2 in this film. You know the franchise has jumped the shark when an evil Peter Parker does a cheesy dance for us wearing eye liner and a curtain hairstyle in the middle of New York.
It wasn’t all bad, though. The special effects were astonishing, film found a memorable way to finally seal the tension between Spiderman and Green Goblin 2 and that final shot of Peter and Mary’s hands uniting was probably a righteous way to end what can be considered a superhero trilogy. Bruce Campbell also has probably the funniest cameo in all of the three movies, too.
But….that dance.
Spider-man 2 (2004)
Spiderman 2 probably has the edge over the original in terms of pure action and entertainment, although the first one contains the superior dramatic factor. This first continuation was much more physical for Spiderman and Alfred Molina’s multi-tentacled Doc Ock had a presence to match.
The ongoing romantic build up between Peter and Mary Jane Watson was still being worked on although it is finally resolved in this film, narrowly avoiding tedium. The newly born friction between Peter and Harry Osborn reaches boiling point, all making for a nail biting secondary plot.
Spider-man (2002)
We thought we only had to witness uncle Ben’s death once when this was released back in 2002. Boy, how wrong we were! Don’t worry. Apparently, we don’t have to see it all again in the next reinvention. Apparently! No promises are being made here. Anyway, the Green Goblin still looks like something out of a Power Rangers television episode but Willem Defoe’s manic performance remains as good as it always has been.
Spiderman had just the right amount of action and heart to make a well rounded superhero picture that was worthy of being made on the 40th anniversary of the character’s creation. Director Sam Raimi proved that he wasn’t a one trick pony who could only direct low budget horror movies and this is probably still his crowning achievement to date, although the man himself may consider the sequel to be that for it’s bigger scope of operation.
