WATCH: The Amazing Spiderman Review

Last night, I ended my long weekend by going to see the first showing of The Amazing Spiderman in IMAX. Spiderman was the first English cartoon I ever got into, and thus I’ve been a spidey-fan for most my life. When I first heard about Sony’s reboot of the Spiderman series, I had mixed feelings because the last Spiderman film wasn’t released that long ago. But although this movie came earlier than it should have, I have no complaints because it truly was “amazing”.

Casting:

Andrew Garfield was a much better Spiderman than I had expected. At first I thought he was too scrawny to play the role, but it turned out that everything fell into place in his portrayal of a high school geek. Unlike Tobey Maguire, Garfield is a more youthful Spiderman who is still very confused about his identity and responsibilities. His acting was impressive to me because he was really able to capture Peter Parker’s fun yet dark character. Also, props to Garfield for having such a good American accent in the movie despite his British roots.
Emma Stone is a great actress, and I don’t deny that. But to me, she doesn’t come off as a 17 year old rich Manhattan girl. There’s a vibe about her that makes her too mature and independent to be Gwen Stacy. Her acting was not bad in the role, but there comes a point when even a great actor can’t fit into a certain pair of shoes.

Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker

Hits:

Action sequences and visual effects were eye-candy
Many heartfelt moments in the movie amidst all the action
Story was largely true to the comics (despite truncations having to be made for time’s sake)

Misses:

The high school setting of this story was a little odd. Can’t they just have kept it as College, like in the comics?
17 year olds as interns having access to top security at the high-tech biomedical Oscorp lab. Hm.

Favourite Scene:

When Peter returns all bruised up from battle and hands Aunt May the eggs she had asked him to buy. It was one of those odd moments when you don’t know whether to laugh or cry. Also, I love how Peter kept the last voicemail that his uncle left him before his death. Like I said, heartfelt moments.

Uncle Ben and Aunt May

Being the Spiderman fan I am, I’m happy to see this spandex-suit superhero pop up on the big screen again. Although Rotten Tomatoes disagrees, I really do feel that this Spiderman flick was better than the last three. The Amazing Spiderman is a good superhero movie that sits somewhere in between the likes of The Avengers and The Dark Knight. It has the Avenger’s liveliness and some of Batman’s deepness, which makes it a film that is definitely worth seeing this summer. Speaking of Batman….17 days till TDKR. Can July get any better?

Rating: