With two more Spider-Man movies possibly in development comes the question of what might be in store for the Web-slinger after the third installment, which more or less ties up the major story arcs in the series.
"Spider-Man 3" complicates matters in that it is jam-packed with characters in promising story arcs that are never effectively utilized before their exploits are concluded. The following are 10 points for consideration should Columbia Pictures make another film in the series.
1. Spider-man/ Peter Parker has too much to do in two hours.
Not only does Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) plan to propose to a girlfriend who is too bitchy to approach and has to compete with an ambitious photographer for a job he has long wanted, he as Spider-Man also has to contend with a new Goblin, take down the mugger who really killed his Uncle Ben (Cliff Robertson) and fight for control of his personality with an alien symbiote.
In other words, the movie is jam-packed with six subplots, one of which is unnecessary and many of which could have been introduced and later developed in another sequel.
2. Venom is horribly utilized.
Moviegoers meet the Venom symbiote when it inexplicably and opportunely lands near where Peter Parker and Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst) just happen to set up a hammock made of webs. Never mind that in the comics it hitched a ride to Earth from The Moon on a space shuttle flown by J. Jonah Jameson's son, John, who was introduced in the second movie as an astronaut.
Spider-Man uses the symbiote's enhanced abilities to seemingly kill The Sandman (Thomas Haden Church) for his role in the murder of Uncle Ben, yet it takes a spirited dance number and inadvertently knocking down Mary Jane to show him that the alien symbiote is something more sinister than a cool new super suit. Peter's new killer dance moves in public are apparently more startling.
When Peter makes the decision to sever his physical bond to the symbiote, he for some unexplained reason decides to go to a church where a giant bell and Eddie Brock (Topher Grace) just happen to be waiting to take the suit off his hands. After Eddie Brock/Venom and Sandman later take MJ hostage, a goblin bomb kills Venom and thus Carnage's future.
Director Sam Raimi said he did not like "the lack of humanity" of Venom, so it is not surprising how mercilessly he misuses and kills one of Spider-Man's main villains.
3. The Sandman is too abstract to carry most of the movie.
Director Sam Raimi's only criteria for including The Sandman in the movie was that he liked the visual appeal of the character.
Yes, Raimi liked The Sandman even though he was unknown to most fans and had very little to do with the pathos of Spider-Man or his alter ego Peter Parker. But Raimi made Flint Marko partly responsible for the death of Uncle Ben, a bold move that did nothing to make the character menacing enough to be taken seriously as a villain or interesting enough to carry most of the movie. Awesome special effects, though. They were also great when they were in "The Mummy."
4. Spider-Man lets a bad guy get away.
Though the plot of the movie teaches about forgiveness, Spidey lets an escaped prisoner get away.
Yes, Flint Marko became a crook to acquire money to help pay for the health care of his sick daughter, but he is a convicted criminal nevertheless and likely returns to crime after Spider-Man forgives him for killing Uncle Ben.
How Peter Parker differentiates Flint's motivation for being involved in theft, grand theft auto and murder from that of his partner in crime is that he assumes the latter was inherently evil. Maybe the carjacker that shot Uncle Ben has a sick daughter too. Peter seems to allow an emo moment of self discovery cloud his better judgement.
What is also deplorable about Spider-man letting The Sandman get away is that it is a contradiction from what he learned after having let Uncle Ben's killer go, that is, that with great power comes great responsibility. How many more people will die because Peter lets The Sandman go is any one's guess and should weigh on his conscious.
5. Venom/Eddie Brock somehow knows about Sandman's sick daughter when they decide to team up to take down Spider-Man.
Peter Parker learns about the desperate condition of Flint Marko's daughter long after his separation from the alien symbiote, so it is curious how Venom/Eddie Brock know this information when he uses it to enrage The Sandman enough to join him in destroying the man who stood in the way of stealing enough money to help her, Spider-man.
6. Peter Parker already got over Uncle Ben's death.
When he first got his powers, Peter Parker dressed up in his pajamas to chase and cause the carjacker he thought killed Uncle Ben to trip out of a warehouse window. He was the same man Peter refused to stop earlier that night from robbing a greedy wrestling promoter, so Peter felt guilty, acted emo in the second movie, but got over the trauma.
Channeling The Hulk, Peter breaks out in a fit of rage when he finds out it was Flint Marko who actually fatally shot his Uncle Ben , so he uses his new black suit to find and kill him.
Luckily, Peter as Spider-Man cannot harm the man who killed his uncle because he has since become a creature made of sand. He thus learns through killing not to kill.
In the fourth movie, Peter might find out Uncle Ben thought his nephew was too emo, leading to the creation of a villain from his neogenic tears dripping into someone's coffee cup.
7. Mary Jane is overly bitchy.
Mary Jane loves Peter Parker, yet she runs to the arms of Harry Osborn (James Franco) when Spider-man starts receiving more positive press than her critically panned debut on Broadway.
Peter tries to reach out to MJ, but instead of listening to reason she goes on a rant about how he does not understand what she is going through and misinterprets his friendship with Gwen Stacy. She looks for any reason to break off the relationship so that she can go live it up with a wealthier, seemingly more dim-witted Harry Osborn.
Instead of telling Peter that a true husband places the needs of his wife first, Aunt May (Rosemary Harris) should say, "You gotta let her whip you if you wanna hit it in Holy Matrimony."
Nothing is wrong with portraying Mary Jane as too hot to trot as in the comic books, but it is not necessary to interpret her as a gold digging bitch to accomplish that goal.
8. Harry Osborn's split personality does not make sense.
The second movie featured Harry encountering an image of his father in a mirror speaking as The Green Goblin (Willem Dafoe), which demands that his murder be avenged. Moviegoers are to assume that Harry was exposed to the same hallucinogenic green gas that drove Norman Osborne crazy and to develop the goblin persona.
Adverse affects of the gas does not make sense because it is unlikely that it produces two separate split personalities that both know Spiderman's secret identity and hence that of his loved ones. Emergence of another Green Goblin villain should include a reasonable explanation for the origin of the figure as a dual identity for both men.
Fans were expecting the revelation that Norman Osborn's Green Goblin survived being impaled by his own glider and that he was exploiting Harry to do his dirty work, especially after Dafoe reprised the character via cameos twice. Such a revelation was seemingly on the horizon, but the comic book source material was scrapped.
9. Harry Osborn switches sides too many times.
Blaming Peter Parker for the murder of his father, Harry sustains an amnesia-causing hit to the head while battling Spider-Man on his goblin glider that causes him to forget he hates his former best friend. Letting bygones be bygones, Harry again suddenly remembers the treacherous rat that killed his father, so he forces Mary Jane to break up with Peter. Again battling Spider-Man, The New Goblin gets his ass handed to him and realizes he has to help his buddy Peter save Mary Jane from two villains.
If a sequel ever materializes, Harry is going to come back from the dead, crash Peter and MJ's wedding on his goblin glider and say, "Guess what guys? I'm bad once again!"
10. Harry Osborn is too messed up in the head.
His father's death and exposure to green gas sparked in Harry a need for hallucinogen-driven blood lust against Spider-Man, but he is not crazy enough to convincingly forgive Peter Parker and befriend Mary Jane in a plot to "attack the heart" of the man underneath the mask. Temporary amnesia is hence required to make the plan seem cooky enough.
0 comments:
Post a Comment