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SPIDER-MAN 3 - REVIEW

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Widely recognised as THE worst Spider-Man film to date, Spider-Man 3 was Sam Raimi's final outing as the Marvel hero's puppetmaster. Watching it back when it came out I was left entertained but a little bit confused to say the least. It looked like a decent Spider-Man movie and yet... Something was a bit off. Spider-Man 3 sees Peter Parker (Tobey Maguire) yet again screwing things up with Mary Jane (Kirsten Dunst) and donning the black Venom suit as a million other things happen. You've got Thomas Haden Church turning into The Sandman and causing havok around the city for whatever reason, you've got James Franco's Harry Osborn finally taking over the Goblin suit (well, a  snowboard and a Cobra outfit), you've got Gwen Stacy (Bryce Dallas Howard) being introduced... it's certainly a handful and much more than just the usual mad-scientist-goes-nuts scenario. By the end you'll be wishing for a straight-forward mad scientist plot though... A lo

SPIDER-MAN - REVIEW

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Sam Raimi may not have seemed like the most obvious choice as director for this first proper Spider-Man movie at the time but he proved everyone wrong creating a popcorn movie with enough entertainment, humour and faithfulness to the comic books to feel like a worthy attempt. The film begins with tedious narration more suited to a Dr Seuss animation and closes with it as well so not the most promising of starts but from the moment we actually meet Tobey Maguire's Peter Parker things start making sense. Raimi goes for a lighthearted tone actually well suited to the character and the whole film feels very much like a comic book. The build-up to Parker becoming Spider-Man is perfectly handled with the film ticking all the right boxes in terms of superhero origin stories: teen romance, tragic family crisis, growing powers/puberty, bullies, clear villain... It's cliched but in a good way. There's a sense that it's all very self-aware and knows what it's doing. I sh