Spider-Man 3

In this third installment of the Spider-Man movie series, we find Peter Parker preparing to pop the big question to his livelong love, Mary-Jane, as she herself prepares to tackle a career as an actress. In the meantime, a convict turns into Sandman and wants to kick the shit out of Spider-Man, and an alien life-form drops to Earth and decides to play piggyback with Parker and his spidersuit. Oh yeah, Harry‘s still pissed off, and there‘s an intro to Ron Howard‘s daughter and James Cromwell shows up for a few lines, etc…

Another fine installment in this very fun and exciting comic book superhero movie series. If I had to rate between the two top comic book trilogies of all-time, between this and the one featuring the X-MEN, I would have to give the small margin of victory to Sam Raimi and his team for creating a consistently entertaining, thoughtful and surprisingly character(and action)-driven movie set. Granted, this third one is definitely the weakest of the three, if not at the very least, the most uneven, but it was still a pretty darn good summer flick, if you ask me. I think they might have had too many plans for this series and just decided to toss all of the remaining leftovers into this supposedly “last” chapter. Perhaps if Bryan Singer had stayed on to continue his brilliant work on the X-MEN flicks, my response might’ve differed, but that’s neither here nor there (than why are you even mentioning it, dipshit?). This third part of the Spidey series starts off with yet another creative and engaging credit intro, and lashes right into its well-known characters, as well as some quick-ass action. The action sequences in this film are as good (if not, better) than the ones from its predecessors, as well as its final battle which goes on for some time and pits men against beasts and provides us with front row seats to it all.

All of our friends are back and even though Tobey Maguire’s Peter Parker goes a little goofy in this one (I coulda done without the Emo haircut and the odd dance sequence), but even then, I guess it did sort of break up the monotony that was becoming Parker’s nerdy character, so the added life was appreciated on some level. Same goes for Harry Osborne, who I was glad to see get that stick removed from his anus in this round, with his character lightening up a little and even offering some challenge to the web-head. That said, if it had been up to me, I would have done away with the whole “Harry vs. Spider-Man“ plotline altogether – I mean, after three films, I was pretty sick of these two whining…let’s get to the new guys already! Which brings us to both Sandman and Venom, both of whom were pretty damn cool in their own right (awesome special effects, bar-none), but neither of which had enough screen-time to warrant much emotional investment, so as cool as they looked and as much as they kicked ass whilst ass-kicking, they never came close to either the Green Goblin or Doc Ock in terms of me really giving a shit about them – although admittedly, Marko’s story did reel me in…good shit, Haden-Church!

But as the film progressed, I did feel as though there were too many plotlines trying to squeeze their way into the top spot, to the point that a scene would finish, and I would be wondering which storyline they would go to next. Would they bring Gwen Stacy into play, the stuff about Peter and Mary and their love-life, the symbiote attempting to attach itself to something, Harry’s revenge plot, Jameson out to get Spidey with Eddie Brock as his lynchpin, the Russian neighbors, etc… I did enjoy the entire Bruce Campbell restaurant cameo though, and Spider-Man changing “moods” as with the color of his suit, but I just wish they’d have chopped the film down to more of its essentials, or concentrated further on either of the real bad guys in the movie. Too many lame coincidences too like when the building is being demolished by the Sandman and the girl who happens to be falling is Gwen Stacy and the cop who happens to be below is her father and the photographer who happens to pull up alongside him is…her boyfriend!! Lame-o. Harry’s butler showing up with some choice words during one of the film’s final “reveals” was also the first real “deux ex machina” I’ve seen in a movie for a long time (Yes! I finally got to use that film term in a review) and I could have done without some of the butter during the film‘s final goodbyes, but heck, it ain’t a Spider-Man movie without you giving a shit about the characters, so let me take that last one back; can’t fault an action movie for actually developing its characters!

So even though this third part does continue to deliver in terms of pacing, awesome action, impressive effects and interesting new bad guys, I do wish they’d have focused it a little more and done away with some of its lame coincidences, but you know what, people might be talking about this comic book trilogy as one of the best of all-time in a few years and you know what once again: I might just be one of those people!! Fun times, I mean really folks…it‘s fuckin‘ Spider-Man!!

(c) 2021 Berge Garabedian