Spider-man 3

Today I watched Spider-man 3 starring Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst. I've always been a fan of Spider-man and Peter Parker starting with collecting and reading Spiderman comics (Marvel) in junior high. Peter Parker is my all-time favourite comic book character.

However, years later I eventually made a conscious decision to stop collecting and reading the comics because the stories stopped appealing to me. They were becoming very soap opera-ish and the final straw was when Peter and MJ's daughter was kidnapped immediately after birth but presumed dead. Oh yeah, and that whole "Peter is a clone oops Ben is really the clone" plot was a whole bunch of stupid, too. Perhaps it's just the nature of a long running comic. The writers need to continually come up with ways to bump up sales and keep the drama going, but the result was my increasing frustration with tired, overdone stories, and the emotional roller coaster the writer's continuously put Peter through.

So when the original Spider-man movie was released I had mixed emotions. I was definitely looking forward to it, but after what happened with the latter Batman movies (after Tim Burton and Michael Keaton left) I was worried that justice wouldn't be done to Peter Parker/Spider-man. Happily, my worries were unfounded. Spider-man met and exceeded all of my hopes and expectations.

With Spider-man 2, again I was looking forward to it though I still worried, but my worry was mitigated by the knowledge that the original cast and Sam Raimi were still involved in the franchise.

So now we're at the 2nd sequel, Spider-man 3. I think this film ranks third among the movies, though it's still good and worth the ticket price. When I first saw/read the previews, I was not happy with it having three villains. I'm more interested in Peter Parker, not the bad guy du jour, so the necessity of introducing two new characters and reminding the audience of Peter-Harry history uses up time I feel could be better spent. But my fears for the most part were unrealized. They didn't spend too much time on the villains--just enough to get an idea of their motivations and how they gained their powers. Nevertheless, I think this movie would have been better served by having fewer antagonists. Save them for future movies!

As I said, I think this latest movie is the lesser of the three. It lacks the emotional punch the original had, and none of the action scenes came close to matching the train fight scene with Dr. Octopus in Spider-man 2.

So what is this movie about? I won't spoil it too much. Peter and Mary Jane's relationship is still maturing and is complicated by, in no particular order, Peter becoming a little too full of himself because of Spider-man's good press, MJ's career troubles, an alien symbiote, an ambitious and not very ethical photographer, Harry's thirst for vengeance for his father's death, and Peter's desire to avenge his Uncle Ben's murder.

You'd think with the success of the first three movies, I'd be happy Sony Pictures is talking about another 3 movies or more in the Spider-man franchise, but I'm not. On the one hand, it would be nice if there was another movie so that the series could end on a higher note. On the other hand, I think the movies have become progressively less entertaining, so if the trend continues further movies will only degrade the quality of the Spider-man franchise. I think any chance of future success for this franchise is dependent upon keeping the original cast and on Sam Raimi directing, or at least having a director with the same vision as Raimi.

3.5 stars out of 5