The Amazing Spider-Man 2

Ah, today’s CGI’s effects.  To see Spidey soaring through the New York skyline with his time-honed web-slinging skills is indeed a spectacle to behold.  I missed some of the practical effects from the first Amazing Spider-Man, but the CGI animation in this film is so good that only once in a while do you remember that his swinging is just a really well done cartoon.  They haven’t mastered the running figure yet—one scene where he was running on a ledge didn’t look quite right. 

Hans Zimmer composed a new and catchy fanfare for Spider-Man that sticks in your head after you’ve heard it a hundred times by trumpet, strings and piano in different tempos and various scenes.  Having said that I kinda wish Zimmer would tone down some of the percussiveness in his recent scores which, after a while, grate on the brain and can overcome some of the movie.  I think Hans needs to go back a little bit in time to some of his more subdued, blend-into-the-scene audio artwork--like on the Lion King.  I feel like his music is yelling at me lately.

Marc Webb is a good director and knows emotion well and directs Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone in their great roles as Peter and Gwen.  Sally Field is a great Aunt May.  The script is good, Spidey’s quips and classic humor are well written.  Gwen Stacey’s speech is inspiring.  The story is a good one as well, although I think they could have just stuck to a Goblin story-line with Harry and not jam packed it as much as they did.  Having said that, Electro is cool and his story is a good lesson on how it is dangerous to ignore invisible people and how it can result in deep anger that, when is has simmered long enough, will explode.  They are quite obviously setting up the third installment and introduced Gobby as the head of the sinister six.  There is a great David and Goliath scene that sticks in your heart.  I felt the tension in my gut as the suspense of the climactic battle scene unfolded, echoing the tragic comic, The Amazing Spider-Man #121.  It was all very well done.  Stan Lee was brilliant when he invented such a fallible, non-perfect, not-able-to-fix-it-all human hero.  

All in all I really enjoyed Spidey 2.  I’d give it 7.5 outta 10.

'Nuff Said.