Notice: All forms on this website are temporarily down for maintenance. You will not be able to complete a form to request information or a resource. We apologize for any inconvenience and will reactivate the forms as soon as possible.

Bugged by Spidey?


spider-man2.JPGWill the real Spider-Man please stand up?

OK, color me conflicted. I’m a long-time Spider-Fan who, on one hand, really enjoyed the new Andrew Garfield reboot, The Amazing Spider-Man. As a film unto itself, Amazing delivers 137 minutes of popcorn-gobbling fun that, in some ways, actually improves upon Sam Raimi’s 2002 blockbuster starring Tobey Maguire (beginning with Stan Lee’s cameo). But at the same time, it left me with a few questions for the fine folks at Marvel, starting with…

1. So which is the “real” Hollywood origin story? Spider bite aside, most of the details surrounding Peter Parker’s transformation into a unitard-clad wall-crawler have been nipped, tucked or totally retooled from 2002’s Spider-Man. He encounters the spider under different circumstances. The sticky stuff isn’t organic; it comes from web shooters. Peter also learns to harness his newfound powers while battling the Lizard (not Green Goblin), pining for Gwen Stacy (instead of Mary Jane Watson) and trying to overcome bad PR from a hard-nosed police chief (rather than a hard-nosed newspaper editor). There’s no Harry. No job at the Daily Bugle. The writers even changed the details of Uncle Ben’s death.

So which is it? Are we to assume that the Maguire trilogy never happened? Was it just a dream? An alternate reality? I mean, who engineered this script, the writers of Lost? After 10 years and three movies, should I forget everything I’ve learned about Peter Parker, I guy I probably knew better than I know most of my Facebook friends? And it’s not just Peter…

2. Did you have to recast the whole thing? We understood that Andrew Garfield would be taking Tobey Maguire’s place, but why clean house? Marvel could have figured out a way to tell this same basic story (post-origin and pre-engagement to Mary Jane) while providing a sense of continuity via minor characters. I don’t have anything against Sally Field. In fact, I like her. I really like her. But after three films, I’d also grown quite fond of Rosemary Harris as Aunt May. And I missed J.K. Simmons’ bombast as J. Jonah Jameson. Their presence would’ve helped to build a bridge between the first series and the new one. Instead, as much as I liked this movie, I couldn’t help but feel less connected to the characters and to the franchise as a whole. Oh well, at least it’s still set in New York.

3. Why now, with memories of Raimi’s enormously popular series so fresh? Actually, I already know the answer to that one. We can trace this $215 million summer tent pole movie back to a decision made in August of 2009. That’s when Walt Disney Co. agreed to purchase Marvel Entertainment for about $4 billion. One of the terms stated that Sony needed to make another Spider-Man movie by a certain point, or Disney would obtain all rights to the character at no cost. The clock was ticking. And with Nick Fury’s gang sure to rake in billions—both on their own and as The Avengersit made perfect spider-sense for Sony to get a fresh franchise up and running. The sequel is due in 2014.

So what do you think? If you’ve already seen the new film, how well did it work for you? Does anything about the reboot bug you? Or is it all a reasonable price to pay for the return of your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man? Honestly, I’m still trying to decide where I fall on that spectrum.