Film | The Amazing Spider-Man

The Amazing Spider-Man is a reboot of the film trilogy started by Sam Raimi in 2002--the first movie was good, the second was the best, and the third was a horrifying trainwreck that brought the entire series to a screeching halt.

Which is probably why they decided to redo the entire franchise; this new movie de-ages the main character, Peter Parker, by placing him back in high school, and brings back his original girlfriend in the comics, Gwen Stacy, who's more pro-active here than Mary Jane Watson, who was nothing more than a perpetual damsel in distress in the original trilogy.

The younger characters and setting bring a somewhat fresh perspective to the movie, but the main villain is a bit of a downer--it's none other than Xenophilius Lovegood Dr. Curt Connors, who transforms into The Lizard halfway into the movie, making it into some kind of biomonster flick.

Andrew Garfield's Spider-Man is leaner and is almost as wiry as the comics version, and he superbly nails down the character's trademark snappy patter while battling villains. But he's probably the most irresponsible Spider-Man ever; he literally jaunts through most of the movie with his mask off, and several characters eventually learn about his alter ego. So whatever happened to all that secret identity stuff?

Spidey's new textured and shimmery costume is okay, but I really hated those sneaker things he wore on his feet--WTF were those for? It looked really stupid. The web-shooters are a mystery as well--did he steal them from OsCorp?

Speaking of OsCorp, it's unbelievable than a billion-dollar tech corporation with an ultra-sophisticated lab set-up doesn't have enough security systems, allowing a teenager access into top secret rooms with radioactive spiders. And I'm not sure I liked the way the film linked OsCorp as the cause of Peter's transformation to Spider-Man.

The Lizard's motivations as a villain were also unclear--what exactly did he want, a world filled with lizard-men? Everything seemed ridiculous towards the end of the film, with the N.Y.P.D. acting like idiots--people are turning into reptiles left and right, and the police seemed only focused on shooting Spider-Man. Way to go with your priorities!

During the post-credits scene, a shadowy man confronts the now incarcerated Dr. Connors. Who was that man? The Green Goblin? Mysterio? Loki? Professor X? Uncle Ben who's not really dead and in disguise? The producers probably wanted to keep an air of mystery about the guy, but by not revealing him, most of the audience just didn't care.

While The Amazing Spider-Man adds new life into the old franchise, it lacked something, and didn't have much of an impact on me because I've seen it all before. It was good, but hardly amazing.