Spider-man (2002) VS. The Amazing Spider-man (2012)

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Which one do you think is better? It's probably been done before on here, but this is my opinion of comparing one to the other.

SPOILERS

In Spider-man I like how it opens up but once Peter is infected I thought he was probably too happy about recieving his powers and wasn't freaked out enough. Perhaps that's not a large complaint. But I also did not like the love between Peter, Mary Jane, and Harry. I felt it didn't add anything at all, especially since you know Peter is going to get Mary Jane in the end, and the triangle is going to be completely forgotten about.

I know the it has to be a challenge for the main character to get the girl, I just didn't think adding another guy in with the challenge was necessary, as oppose to the challenge of trying to get a single girl in comparison.

When Peter confronts the man who killed his uncle, then man backs up trips, over a pipe, and falls out the window. I thought this was too convenient. The writers didn't want to write it so that Peter kills the guy, but they also didn't want the guy to escape and be continue to be part of the story. So they just said, hey let's have him conveniently and randomly trip over a pipe and die to get rid of this part of the plot. I felt it could have been handled better.

I also really like Willem Dafoe's performance but I felt the Green Goblin character was somewhat underdeveloped, and you don't really know what his plan is or what he wants to do. You know he wants to get Spider-man out of the way, so he can execute whatever evil plan he has. But you don't know what he wants to do at all, and they never reveal that.

As for the positive's I do like the a lot of the origin story part of it, such as the wrestling portion. And I love J. Jonah Jamison.

When it comes to The Amazing Spider-man, I thought that the way Peter receives his powers was better handled. I also like how he never finds his Uncle's killer, and decides to be a hero and protect people, after hearing the lecture from Captain Stacy, which I thought was a great character develop for Peter.

I also felt that The Lizard was a better villain than the Green Goblin and thought he was better developed.

I felt that the story built towards a much better climax and ending, without introducing things like a love triangle that didn't do anything for me. It was much more taut I thought. The cons are we have no wrestling subplot, which I liked the in the first one. I also like how Peter took more time to develop his powers, where as in the first one, he mastered them too fast per say.

The downside of this one is that it introduces Norman Osborne by telling and showing and then they just forget about him, when I felt this subplot needed more development to be a great movie, instead of just a good movie. I also felt that the man who was The Lizard's boss that blackmailed him was not forgotten about after the bridge fight. But still a better movie than the former.

What do you think?



Welcome to the human race...
For me, Spider-Man is the vastly superior film in just about every regard.

In Spider-man I like how it opens up but once Peter is infected I thought he was probably too happy about recieving his powers and wasn't freaked out enough. Perhaps that's not a large complaint.
I reckon that makes sense, especially since he first ends up actively using those powers to defend himself against the jock who bullies him. It's not like we really need to see him freaking out for any prolonged period of time - the MCU version dropped that aspect completely. Just address it for a couple of minutes and then move on.

But I also did not like the love between Peter, Mary Jane, and Harry. I felt it didn't add anything at all, especially since you know Peter is going to get Mary Jane in the end, and the triangle is going to be completely forgotten about.

I know the it has to be a challenge for the main character to get the girl, I just didn't think adding another guy in with the challenge was necessary, as oppose to the challenge of trying to get a single girl in comparison.
But he doesn't really get her in the end (of the first one, anyway) because of the whole protecting her from her secret identity thing. It's also challenging on a personal level as he has to weigh his love for Mary-Jane against his friendship with Harry, so there's an appreciable complexity to the proceedings.

When Peter confronts the man who killed his uncle, then man backs up trips, over a pipe, and falls out the window. I thought this was too convenient. The writers didn't want to write it so that Peter kills the guy, but they also didn't want the guy to escape and be continue to be part of the story. So they just said, hey let's have him conveniently and randomly trip over a pipe and die to get rid of this part of the plot. I felt it could have been handled better.
That suits me fine. Sometimes you just need those little moments of convenience so that the story can move on to bigger and better things, plus it pushes forth the idea that Peter's subsequent heroics aren't about trying to get revenge but just a matter of simply doing the right thing and honouring Uncle Ben's great-responsibility ethos.

I also really like Willem Dafoe's performance but I felt the Green Goblin character was somewhat underdeveloped, and you don't really know what his plan is or what he wants to do. You know he wants to get Spider-man out of the way, so he can execute whatever evil plan he has. But you don't know what he wants to do at all, and they never reveal that.
Norman's established goal is to save his company - he becomes the Goblin because he's trying to keep a lucrative military contract and the Goblin's actions are all supposed to be him acting on his darker impulses to achieve the goal, which he can't do as Norman. Consider his targets - the scientist who questioned him, the military officers who refused to deal with him, the board members who voted to remove him...all of them are obstacles that threaten him and his company (which eventually includes Spider-Man). Just because there's no big speech or spelled-out take-over-the-world plan doesn't mean that he lacks motivation or a plan - it's just a bit more subtle about it than your average movie.

When it comes to The Amazing Spider-man, I thought that the way Peter receives his powers was better handled. I also like how he never finds his Uncle's killer, and decides to be a hero and protect people, after hearing the lecture from Captain Stacy, which I thought was a great character develop for Peter.
Like I said before, it doesn't sit right with me because it seems like he just takes ages to come to that conclusion (and doesn't do so organically if it's a matter of being told what's right by other characters) so he's essentially a family-friendly version of Death Wish.

I also felt that The Lizard was a better villain than the Green Goblin and thought he was better developed.

I felt that the story built towards a much better climax and ending, without introducing things like a love triangle that didn't do anything for me. It was much more taut I thought. The cons are we have no wrestling subplot, which I liked the in the first one. I also like how Peter took more time to develop his powers, where as in the first one, he mastered them too fast per say.
That's the trade-off you have to make - you can't have the wrestling sub-plot and have him take ages to develop his powers (unless you want it to run way longer than it has to). I barely remember anything about the rest of the film, though - they fight on a tower or something?
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This might just do nobody any good.
I’ll say this - in The Amazing Spider-Man, Uncle Ben dies because Peter wouldn’t pay for chocolate milk.



Movie Forums Squirrel Jumper
For me, Spider-Man is the vastly superior film in just about every regard.

I reckon that makes sense, especially since he first ends up actively using those powers to defend himself against the jock who bullies him. It's not like we really need to see him freaking out for any prolonged period of time - the MCU version dropped that aspect completely. Just address it for a couple of minutes and then move on.

When you say the MCU version do you mean, The Amazing Spider-man?
I thought that that one shows him trying to develop his powers over a longer period of time,
since we get the montage


But he doesn't really get her in the end (of the first one, anyway) because of the whole protecting her from her secret identity thing. It's also challenging on a personal level as he has to weigh his love for Mary-Jane against his friendship with Harry, so there's an appreciable complexity to the proceedings.

He still got her in the sense that she told Peter that she wanted him and Peter chose to turn her down. So he still got her, he just chose to turn her down, and the love triangle is still unnecessary I felt

That suits me fine. Sometimes you just need those little moments of convenience so that the story can move on to bigger and better things, plus it pushes forth the idea that Peter's subsequent heroics aren't about trying to get revenge but just a matter of simply doing the right thing and honouring Uncle Ben's great-responsibility ethos.

I guess but I felt if they needed to get rid of the this plot element, they could have done it, in a more thoughtful way.

Norman's established goal is to save his company - he becomes the Goblin because he's trying to keep a lucrative military contract and the Goblin's actions are all supposed to be him acting on his darker impulses to achieve the goal, which he can't do as Norman. Consider his targets - the scientist who questioned him, the military officers who refused to deal with him, the board members who voted to remove him...all of them are obstacles that threaten him and his company (which eventually includes Spider-Man). Just because there's no big speech or spelled-out take-over-the-world plan doesn't mean that he lacks motivation or a plan - it's just a bit more subtle about it than your average movie.

But Norman doesn't make any effort to after the people in his company that screwed him over. He only makes one attempt on their lives, and Spider-man saves them.
Norman was free to try to kill them again at anytime, but he chooses to go after Spider-man,
his aunt, and Mary-Jane, instead of the people at his company. If the people he wanted to kill were under Spider-man's personal 24 hour, 7 days a week protection, then it would make sense to go after Spider-man but Spider-man was nowhere near the people from the company after the first attempt on them.

So Norman screwed up all his chances for some reason, and thus I did not know what his goal really was, since he kept passing up on it, if killing those men was his only goal.


Like I said before, it doesn't sit right with me because it seems like he just takes ages to come to that conclusion (and doesn't do so organically if it's a matter of being told what's right by other characters) so he's essentially a family-friendly version of Death Wish.

That's the trade-off you have to make - you can't have the wrestling sub-plot and have him take ages to develop his powers (unless you want it to run way longer than it has to). I barely remember anything about the rest of the film, though - they fight on a tower or something?
And yes I agree, that Spiderman 2 is the best one.



“Hell will hold no surprises for you.”
The first Spiderman is better by far.

Spiderman 2 is still the best one though.



The Bib-iest of Nickels
In my opinion, The Amazing Spider-Man is simply an average film, whereas I thought that the first Spider-Man film was a fantastic superhero film. However, I am biased, and I watched the first Spider-Man in theaters when I was like six or seven, and I have a nostalgic affection for it as a result. Still, even without that affection, I think I'd like Spider-Man more than Amazing, simply because it had a stronger villain portrayal and overall framework. I do think that the current iteration of Spider-Man that started with Homecoming has the potential to produce a film as good or on-par with Spider-Man or Spider-Man 2, however. Although, I don't think Homecoming reached that level, but thought it was very good.



what made spiderman 2002 rewatchable is the fact that it had a very good villain and actor in "willem defoe", i like him a lot as the goblin, he never disappoints when he s the bad guy.
i like how his dialogue was written, when aunt may is praying and he comes to the room:
Finishhhh it, finishhh it with his sadistic voice
and deliver us from.evil
i really like this film, and i have to say kirsten dunst is so F*****le in this one



Movie Forums Squirrel Jumper
Oh really I feel like the Willem Dafoe was perhaps maybe two over the top compared to Kurt Connors/The Lizard. Kurt Conners is portrayes as a more sympathetic villain, were as Nornan Osborne is so over the top crazy, you don't get any empathy much.

One thing a lot of people complain about in The Amazing Spider-man is that Uncle Ben's killer is forgotten about. But I don't think this is a bad thing is it? Just because a character decides to be a vigilante, does not mean that character, has to run into the same criminal that caused, it later on.

For example, Death Wise (1974), did the same thing and no one complains about it there. So isn't that an unfair complaint?

Plus in the 2002 Uncle Ben's killer is finished off by conveniently tripping over a pipe and conveniently falling out a window. Isn't that just too convenient, and bad writing?



Welcome to the human race...
When you say the MCU version do you mean, The Amazing Spider-man?
I thought that that one shows him trying to develop his powers over a longer period of time,
since we get the montage
I mean the Tom Holland version, which essentially skips over Uncle Ben and having to learn how to use his powers.

He still got her in the sense that she told Peter that she wanted him and Peter chose to turn her down. So he still got her, he just chose to turn her down, and the love triangle is still unnecessary I felt
Still doesn't count, plus the love triangle proves an interesting complication when you also factor in how Spider-Man technically makes it more of a quadrangle.

I guess but I felt if they needed to get rid of the this plot element, they could have done it, in a more thoughtful way.
Like having someone else murder the guy instead like Batman Begins did? The character's just such a non-entity that it doesn't really matter how he gets got.

But Norman doesn't make any effort to after the people in his company that screwed him over. He only makes one attempt on their lives, and Spider-man saves them.
Norman was free to try to kill them again at anytime, but he chooses to go after Spider-man, his aunt, and Mary-Jane, instead of the people at his company. If the people he wanted to kill were under Spider-man's personal 24 hour, 7 days a week protection, then it would make sense to go after Spider-man but Spider-man was nowhere near the people from the company after the first attempt on them.

So Norman screwed up all his chances for some reason, and thus I did not know what his goal really was, since he kept passing up on it, if killing those men was his only goal.
Yes, he does? It's during the parade sequence where he throws a pumpkin bomb at those two main board members (the old guy with a mustache and the bald guy in a wheelchair) and incinerates them. It's only then that he has his first confrontation with Spider-Man and he realises how much of a threat Spider-Man poses to him, which is why he goes after J. Jonah Jameson for information and then tries to convince Spider-Man to join forces with him. It's only after that that he goes all in on attacking Spider-Man and his loved ones.



I just realized that Tom Holland is the kid from The Impossible (2012). Great movie if you're in the mood for real-life tragedy and disaster.
No wonder I liked him so much (he's a great Peter Parker for a new generation, however, the movies leave much to be desired).

Nothing done since compares with the first 2 Tobey Maguire Spider-Man films.



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Still doesn't count, plus the love triangle proves an interesting complication when you also factor in how Spider-Man technically makes it more of a quadrangle.
Oh okay, I guess I just felt that any love triangle or quadrangle was unnecessary for this story.

Like having someone else murder the guy instead like Batman Begins did? The character's just such a non-entity that it doesn't really matter how he gets got.
Batman Begins though, the murder was deliberate on the crime bosses part, and it's part of theme of the story. Spider-man it was just a convenient fluke it felt like in comparison.

Yes, he does? It's during the parade sequence where he throws a pumpkin bomb at those two main board members (the old guy with a mustache and the bald guy in a wheelchair) and incinerates them. It's only then that he has his first confrontation with Spider-Man and he realises how much of a threat Spider-Man poses to him, which is why he goes after J. Jonah Jameson for information and then tries to convince Spider-Man to join forces with him. It's only after that that he goes all in on attacking Spider-Man and his loved ones.
This establishes some of Norman's character, but I really think they needed more on what was going to happen with him after he chose to murder the executives. Spider-man is not guarding them 24/7 so Norman could have killed them anytime after. If Norman had bigger plans, he felt Spider-man would get in the way of, I thought they should establish those bigger plans, like they do with other The Lizard, or Dr. Octopus.