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The Amazing Spider-Man 2 Full Reaction

Full Reaction You can either stream the Full reaction below using the embedded video player, otherwise you can click the 'Download' button which will take you directly to Google Drive, enabling you to save the video to your computer instead. You must provide your own footage to watch alongside the full reactions.

Comments

Aaron L

The Gwen situation happens almost exactly the same in the comics.

Ryan

I have exactly one nice thing to say about this movie: They clearly paid attention to the issues fans had with the first movie's ending, with all the attention in this one about how Peter actually feels very uneasy about not following Captain Stacy's dying wish (though I really wish they'd come up with a better way of showing it than just having Stacy repeatedly give him a disapproving look, which legit had me wondering if I was misremembering that he died for a while). And now for the rest: The first movie was already a purely corporate product made entirely to hold onto the character rights, and this one is even more shameless about it, shoving in every bit of Spider-Man lore they could possibly think of with no thought to how it could fit together into a coherent story, and any human connection between the audience and the characters being purely coincidental. About the only ones who consistently work are Peter and Gwen, which makes sense since Mark Webb is primarily a romantic comedy director who I've always suspected was hired for these movies purely because of his name. And ironically, in throwing all this stuff together, they also didn't have enough room for the one part of the first movie that a lot of people were interested in, the search for Uncle Ben's killer. We already know exactly who it was, so what the hell else was going to be revealed about that to make it worth extending this subplot past the first movie? Apparently we'll never know. In the meantime, we also have to deal with Peter again being a giant prick who refuses to save his childhood best friend because...the blood could make him die slightly faster, I guess, and the story ends up throwing away the perfectly decent setup for the Green Goblin we'd already established with Norman bankrolling the Lizard experiments, in favor of a ridiculous-looking Harry. Which of course then leads into the movie killing off Gwen, the only thing about these movies that a sizable amount of people generally liked, for literally no reason besides it being what happened to her in the comics. In fact, the backlash to this was so huge that before the series got scrapped, the plans for the third film involved Peter literally CURING DEATH for the sole purpose of bringing her back. I was absolutely done with these movies after seeing this one, and it was a big relief to see Spider-Man finally get brought over into the MCU after it became the lowest-grossing Spider-Man film ever. As for what happened there...well, you'll see.

Anonymous

Again, I'm probably going to need to space comments out. Start by saying it is nice to see your love for the Amazing Spider-Man films, even though I don’t share the opinion. Point of fact, this one, The Amazing Spider-Man 2: The Good, The Bloat, and The Messy, for me is very much a mixed bag of a film. I did have a better time with it this time, though the opinion is closer to lukewarm leaning towards positive. I wish I had a significantly improved opinion to share with you, sorry. I’m going to first vent, you know, get it off my chest about how ungodly PISSED OFF I was and still am over the obscenely CRIMINAL underuse of Paul Giamatti as Rhino in this movie. My brother, likewise, is livid over that as well. We both love that man to pieces. Watching this film again with you, I find I'm echoing my initial thoughts on the matter when this film first came out, those thoughts being, “Did you guys seriously go to the trouble to get Paul to be a major Spider-Man villain in this movie, and then proceed to only give him five-ten minutes, if that of screen time in an over two-hour movie? Am I right about that? Right? That's what happened here? That's what you guys did? WHAT ARE YOU HIGH OR SOMETHING!?!?! YOU’RE JUST GOING TO WASTE THE TALENTS OF ONE OF THE BEST ACTORS LIKE THAT!?!?!” To a lesser extent, I'm disappointed by Norman Osborn’s minimal screentime. Though I highly doubt it would have surpassed the previous portrayal, when I heard the casting, I did get excited, thinking, “Chris Cooper is an excellent actor. I'm curious how that’s going to play out; what that’s going to be like.” In terms of bright spots in this, we have Jamie Foxx as Electro. I loved the performance that he brought to this. Another big highlight is again the great Sally Field. I KNEW her big scene would get to you, and even then, I was unprepared for how much your reaction to that got me. The portrayal of Harry is interesting. Yes, Harry is a prominent character of the mythos. No real objection to the portrayal here. As you note, the messiness persists. I’m with you on understanding and sympathizing with Harry, particularly as he notes, he’s dying anyway, thus, he has nothing to lose. Again, I have massive issues with the convoluted unnecessarily dramatic plotline with Peter’s parents. And I repeat my complaint of how his mom is practically an afterthought, which is still insulting. I'm going to be something of an asshole in still having problems with the romance plotline. There again, really nothing wrong with it, it frustrates me this film. Specifically, the mixed messages both parties send each other. You get Peter’s guilt given the promise he made which he is flouting. Said guilt manifesting in the form of Disapproving Ghost Dad Denis Leary. Sure, he can claim that he hasn’t a qualm, but try as he might, Spider-Man never can run from nor hide from the eyes of Disapproving Ghost Dad Denis Leary. Disapproving Ghost Dad Denis Leary is always watching. ALWAYS! Likewise, I'm not unsympathetic to Gwen being insistent on it being her choice, I would, however, have liked more dialogue that shows she does fully understand her dad’s concern, even though she disagrees with it. I also get pulled out of it some when she says, “I break up with you.” leading me to chime in with, “Are you saying that’s your plan to do so or is that what you are doing right now? If you’re going to proffer a dissolution of a relationship, could you at least have the common decency to be grammatically correct about it?” Briefly addressing how you didn’t quite know how to feel about the semi-stalking, you said that, and I deadpanned, “At least he’s not following her into the women’s restroom. That's a plus. Right?” And how the film keeps pushing they should be together and I keep thinking maybe the time apart would be helpful to both of them to figure out what it is they really want. I’ve brought that up to some people in discussions of the film and I get called an asshole. Given my absence of any and all romance/dating experience, perhaps they’re right.

Anonymous

Now onto the big emotional moment of the film, the night that Gwen Stacy died, and again, I'm going to be an asshole having problems with it. It's not WHAT happened that irks me so, because it is in the comics. And it is such an infamous moment of the comics that it is borderline common knowledge even amongst non-comic readers. Which, as I type that, I worry that the youtube comment section is going to spam that fact ad infinitum. Hope that doesn’t happen. Best of luck in advance on that. One problem I have is how INSANELY FUCKING obvious (to me, at least) that it was going to happen. The first picture they released of this movie showed Gwen in the exact same outfit she wears in the comics, leading me to note, “Wild guess, Gwen Stacy dies in this.” Her graduation speech also portends her fate, though it seemed not as bad as it was in the past. Watching it this time, I finished that part of the film, and said, “I remember that part of the film being a lot heavier handed. Huh.” This foreknowledge is also a primary reason why my enjoyment of the romance plot this film especially was hampered. The other main bone of contention is the ending following her death in that they condense the five months without Spider-Man into, like a minute, and how they have the “triumphant” ending because the cowards don’t want to have a downbeat ending. I also questioned it when it came out thinking, “Is he really ready to get back into the game? Maybe let’s examine that some? No?” Now, all my complaints notwithstanding, the moment itself IS a most effective and heartbreaking moment. Andrew’s acting in that scene is astonishing. In your first Amazing Spider-Man reaction, it started to become apparent that you are one of the few people who was completely unaware of Gwen’s comic-book fate. And I became so worried, Jess. As we came to the moment, my heart started to threaten to leap out my throat. And to then see your reaction to the moment, Jess, I felt so FUCKING awful seeing the film break your heart the way it did, and then later how you said that the crying gave you the headache that it did. So, although my enjoyment level of the Amazing Spider-Man films is not at the same level as yours is, I am most pleased that you enjoyed the films. And although I’m not the biggest fan of the two films, I did enjoy the time that was had sharing the films with you. I look forward to seeing No Way Home again. I’m sure you’ll love the film yourself. Until then, these reactions were lovely, Jess, thank you.

Ryan

This movie was intended to launch a whole Spider-Man Cinematic Universe for Sony with each of the Sinister Six getting their own movie, which presumably would have included Giamatti as the Rhino. Though considering how crappy their attempts at keeping the idea going with films like Venom and Morbius have turned out, I'd say he dodged a bullet there. On that same note, as much as I love Felicity Jones in Rogue One, it really doesn't feel like she would have made a good Black Cat if the series had gotten that far. And I've seen quite a few people theorize that the whole thing with Peter refusing to give Harry is blood is actually an editing error and the scene was intended to come after he finds out that Oscorp was planning to weaponize the spider blood, which would give him a much better reason to not let Harry get his hands on it despite their friendship than "It might kill you a few days sooner than you're going to die anyway."

Ryan

There's also the fact that, just like Khan in Star Trek Into Darkness and Blofeld in the Daniel Craig Bond films, the Green Goblin is randomly shoved into the story and treated as a big deal entirely because we the audience recognize the character, rather than him meaning anything to Peter and Gwen. From their point of view, they won the day only for this dumb jackass to show up and ruin things out of nowhere.