Spider-Man 2 Review

As Spider-Man fans, we are so lucky. We're very fortunate to have a director like Sam Raimi taking such care of this franchise. We have writers like Alvin Sargent, Alfred Gough, Miles Millar, Michael Chabon and David Koepp who understand plot, dialogue, and what makes us care about a character. We have talented actors and special effects that truly make the comic book page come to life. I cringed at the thought of what the Spider-Man movies very well could have been - a product pushed through the Hollywood digestive tract as fast as possible for rapid mass consumption. Rather, we have a film lovingly crafted, and very satisfying.

I believe Spider-Man 2 was a better movie than the first. The first has a special place in my heart, since it was the pioneer movie. It set the stage, and did things so right. Plus, you can't never recreate the excitement from the novelty of watching Spider-Man 1 for the first time. But Spider-Man 2 had the foundation already established allowing for more action, more humor, more romance, more characterization, and deeper relationships. Plus, despite the Green Goblin being my favorite villain in the comics, I thought Dr. Octopus was a superior villain in part 2. His motivation was more clear, his threat more palpable (what exactly was Norman Osborn's goals exactly once the board of directors were cleared out?), and his battles more interesting.

Without going into too much detail about the plot, some of my favorite moments:

• The train scene - Spider-Man's will power is one of his greatest "powers"
• The tumbling-down-the-building fight scenes with Doc Ock
• "Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head" - cracked me up!
• The increased attention to the Aunt May / Peter Parker relationship
• Harry's last scene!

Other favorites include: the beginning, the middle, and the end!

Look for these little extras:

• Pete's landlord is "Mr. Ditkovitch", in honor of the reclusive original artist and co-creator, Steve Ditko
• Could it be...Gwen Stacy? In Peter David's novelization, Gwen has a line to Pete in Doc Connor's class. In the movie, there's a tall blonde who walks out of Doc Connor's class with Pete right after he gets the answer right to the "eigen value".
• Was that the Green Lantern on that train? Or maybe Samurai Jack? Static Shock? Yep, that sure looked like Phil Lamar, voice actor and comedian from MadTV, on the train to Spidey's left when he passed out from exhaustion.
• and of course, Stan Lee!

Overall, I found so little I could fault with the movie. The worst part is we have to wait 3 years for Spider-Man 3!