Spider-Man 3

Spider-Man is a childhood hero of mine. I've enjoyed the wealth of stories from the comics over the years, and the second Spider-Man film is one of the greatest comic book to film movies ever made. From that standpoint, I not only review this film as a fan, but as a film enthusiast as well.

I was very excited about seeing the black costume and Venom(my personal favorite moments from the comics). Spider-Man 3 was enjoyable entertainment, and broke the "curse" of "Part 3" destroying a good comic movie series (Batman, Superman, and X-Men). This "Part 3", however, didn't overthrow Spider-Man 2 as the best of the series. It could have, but some liberties taken with the film ultimately cost it.

The story arcs for villains Sandman, Harry Osborn (I loathe the name "New Goblin"), and Venom were VERY accurate to their comic counterparts. If some of it seemed a little coincidental or contrived, in honesty, that's how the stories progressed over the years, especially for Harry and Venom. They took a few liberties with Sandman, but the saving grace is that they keep to the trend of not making the "bad guys" one-dimensional villains.

This film dealt with a LOT of plot threads. Venom should have been saved for a fourth film, as once he is "created", he becomes underused, which is a shame for a major villain in the Spider-Man mythos. Truthfully, the film could have worked with or without Venom, who felt like an afterthought or "fan service". However, with 18,000 story lines running rampant in the movie, they somehow manage to keep it all together and pull it through to the end, while tying up the entire plot. That feat alone is impressive, so kudos to the Raimi's writing talents.

Still, these multiple storylines ended up being costly to the overall character development, as it seemed that the only character that went anywhere by the end and moved forward was Harry Osborn. Peter and Mary Jane just didn't seem to end up anywhere new or different by the film's end, leaving them somewhat ambiguous. The same goes for Gwen Stacy. She's another iconic character in the comics, but her status remains unknown. J.K. Simmons' role as J. Jonah Jameson and Bruce Campbell in his "Where's Waldo: Spider-Man Movie Edition" appearances in the film are once again comedy gold.

The real problem of the film lies in the black costume. The comic's concept holds true in the movies, but the added aspect the story gives it also introduces elements in the film that I thought was the worst moment of not only this film, but out of all three films as a whole.

For some reason, the film felt the need for Peter to comb over his hair "emo" style whenever he suited up in the black costume: The "emo" thing as a whole is irksome, but the movie makes it clear this is some conscious and deliberate decision on Peter's part. It's irritating that they would do this, however indirect the reference may have been. And all I could see was "Emo Spider-Man". Leave the fad sub-cultures out of films, please. Not just this film, but any film. It's silly to allow a comb over to show that this is "angry" Peter, as though the audience couldn't figure it out, and pop culture references such as these only end up dating the film.

The second aspect of the film again related to the black costume. Again, in every variation of the comic, the costume isn't supposed to magnify emotions of the wearer. And when they gave that behavioral description in the dialogue, another comic-based film popped into my mind. And sure enough, Peter becomes a disco dancing, crotch thrusting show-off that that seemed to be a direct reference to Jim Carrey's The Mask. If Peter has suddenly cried out "Sssssmokin'", I wouldn't have been surprised. In fact, I was just waiting for him to say it and get it over with. The scene certainly went on long enough, and outwore its welcome. This is the first and only moment of all three films that made me shake my head with disbelief and disappointment.

The final contention point was like the second film, Spider-Man remained unmasked at any given opportunity. I'm sure this was due to making sure Tobey Maguire got some "face" time, but Spider-Man (until recently) had a secret identity. It felt like he'd whip the mask off for no necessary reason at any given time. One starts to question why he even used a mask at all after a while.

Another criticism is the "New Goblin". I never liked the original Green Goblin costume as it was far too "Power Rangers" for its own good, and the biggest deviant of all the character's looks. New Goblin gives Harry an "Extreme snowboarder with an anger management problem" look. Honestly, he could have called himself anything, and the audience would have never made the "Goblin" connection.

Despite some issues, Spider-Man 3 was a very good film. Not a great film, but it was a good closure to the unresolved plot threads of the first two films. And overall, the characters and their motivations remained intact. As a trilogy, the films hold up very well. Thankfully, the story didn't veer off in some alternate direction that seemed inconsistent with the first two films and left one scratching their head in confusion.

That said, as much of a Spider-Man enthusiast as I am, I hope they don't push any farther with the series (though I'm sure they will). There are a lot of stories and villains they can cover, so the lack of source material is in no danger of being used up, but for the first time, I began to see the rough edges start to wear around the series. After the mess made with X-Men 3 (putting a real chink in the armor of that series), it's best to bow out now, and keep the dignity intact of this series. As I said, the movie held up, but it became apparent that it's not going to always be so lucky in the future.