After the criticism of Spider-Man 3, something had to be done to keep the character alive in film form. Don’t get me wrong, I love every Spider-Man film ever made just because they involve my favorite superhero. When looking at it from a critical angle, especially after hearing other criticisms and watching it again to see what people were talking about, there are some things I need to say…and Spider-Man 3 was only strike one.

When The Amazing Spider-Man was announced, I was ecstatic! The Lizard, as a villain, has never piqued by interest, but I was more interested in Sony starting fresh with the character. After watching it for the first time, I thought it was done well and was hopeful for the future of the franchise. Looking back on it, especially after having seen it plenty more times, the origin was focused on way too much. It took up about half of the film showing us a story we’ve already seen once on the big screen. Not only that, but the hype behind “The Untold Story” behind the origin was hardly explored, and that’s something I really wanted to see. Webb tried to compensate by including its continuation in The Amazing Spider-Man 2, but that contributed to that film’s main problem that I’ll get to later. Long story short, the retelling of the origin did damage that could’ve been undone if Webb had just explored what was just so new and different about it in a proper amount of time.

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was something I was ready for as soon as I lost interest in the first The Amazing Spider-Man film. I was ready to be fully immersed in the experiences of the matured-past-origin superhero we know and love. What intrigued me the most was the Green Goblin/Death of Gwen Stacy plot. Electro was a villain I was interested in ever since I fought him in the Ultimate Spider-Man video game.

Who knew that the stories I was most interested in would overload the film? Starting off with Peter’s parents, again, Webb tries to compensate by continuing the Parkers’ escape in the beginning, then cramming the subplot into the rest of the film. Let’s face it, the resolution in which Peter discovers that the reason the spider bite gave him his powers was because it was compatible with his blood would’ve been better in the first film to replace much of what we already know. Spider-Man’s encounter with Rhino was short and sweet, and I would’ve love to have seen that happen with other villains throughout the film in order establish the Sinister Six because their formation involves them having been beaten by Spider-Man at least once before. This would’ve taken the place of the Electro storyline. All in all, we didn’t need the amount of story we received in this film, and the damage was made apparent when we reached Gwen’s death. It shocked audiences, much like the comic did, but the trouble was in the aftermath. We don’t understand the significance of this event that’s supposed to be significant because it happened so close to the end that it couldn’t be explored, all because there was just too many subplots.

As a result, these two films failed in some respect. To keep us busy until the third film in 2018, I’m hoping they’ll follow through with The Sinister Six, the Venom spin-off, and the female led spin-off to give us something different from the usual superhero film, granted it’s done well. Part of me thinks everything in between is going to be very risky because of just how backwards the concepts are, so they must be done well, and the news of supposedly rebooting Spider-Man again with The Sinister Six and yet another possible cancellation of the Venom spin-off doesn’t help matters.

It hurts me even more to know that Sony is holding so tightly on to the rights to Spider-Man for dear life, despite how bad it’s getting, that the Marvel Cinematic Universe might be planning on using the Black Panther, a superhero I know absolutely nothing about and therefore have no interest in whatsoever, as a back-up for Spider-Man in their Civil War story. Spider-Man is a superhero in his prime at this point in time. The Amazing Spider-Man took place after The Avengers, and so he wasn’t there to fight alongside them because he wasn’t Spider-Man yet. We can say that Spider-Man only just came out of his hiatus after Gwen’s death during their fight with Ultron and wasn’t ready for a conflict so gratifying. Bringing Spider-Man into the MCU would breathe new life into this version of the character.

The other part of me is extremely glad and hopeful that The Amazing Spider-Man 3 was pushed from 2016 to 2018. I feel as if those behind the film are aware of these issues and aim to fix them. Despite what’s happened with the first two films, the third and final film needs to round out the franchise by making it a trilogy. Not only that, but it has to redeem it. The idea of a Clone Saga story is perfect. Bringing back Emma Stone as Gwen Stacy as the cloned love interest would round out Gwen Stacy being the love interest for the trilogy because of their amazing chemistry. Cloning Peter’s parents could round out that subplot to tie up any other loose ends. Finally, the cloning of Spider-Man himself as a main conflict with Ben Reilly, Kaine, or any of his other clones with a clone of Norman Osborn orchestrating it all with the help of Miles Warren makes for the best, most balanced story since Spider-Man 2. They can even introduce Mary Jane at the end of the film as a glimmer of actual (not cloned) hope for the rest of Peter’s life and conclude the story well.

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