I’ll be resurrecting the ole’ thumb rating for this one, so lets get started…remember this:

Three Thumbs Up: So amazing I sprouted another hand!
Two Thumbs Up: Great!!!
Thumb Up: Good
Thumb in the middle: Ok
Thumb Down: Bad
Two Thumbs Down: Horrible
Three Thumbs Down: Clawing my eyes out would have been better and more enjoyable.

And lets not forget about these additional bad boys:

DVD Purchase Worthy=Even better!!!!
Rent or On Demand Worthy=Good but not that good
Wait till on cable=not worth the money
Just don’t waste your time=don’t even bother

I’m going to review a little and rant a little and then finally I’ll give it its rating, SPOILER ALERT! you’ve been warned, so here goes

Spiderman 3 had some great build up to it. The amazing Spiderman 2 was huge! It had a great story, great villian (my personal favorite Spiderman villian) and it just settled well with me. I got it. There wasnt’ too much going on or too little. It wasn’t just a superhero movie, it was more than just that. It was a story about a superhero and how they would be treated and how they would act in the real world. How superheros with all these powers and abilities still also have to realize that they have human emotions and are constantly plagued by these emotions because of who they are and because of what elements are in their personal lives and how all of those effect who we are and how far we can go. In Spiderman 2 Peter Parker is dragged down emotionally through the film because of the fact that he is Spiderman and Peter Parker and he can’t find a way to suitably balance the two out which effects him and causes him to loose his powers and how that completely effected his life (personal and hero). This is the complete and utter opposite of Spiderman 3.

I might be a little harsh with Spidey 3 but it is in no way anything like X3 or, dare I say it, Batman and Robin. X3 also had everything going for it and they threw it all out of the way even before the 20th Century Fox logo came up as if they just wanted to get away from everything that Bryan Singer had developed and cared so much about (before he went on to make Superman Returns) and just take a shit on it. Batman and Robin was simply a pile of shit. I’m not comparing Spiderman 3 to these two movies. I think Spiderman 3 is a good summer movie that could have been the best of the Spiderman series. They just wanted to do too much.

In Spiderman 2, everything made sense. Things happened for a reason as if it were written in the scrolls. As if fate were happening. In 3 things just happened to push to the next action scene. I didn’t care much for what they did with Peter Parker and Mary Jane. The poor guy fought his ass off in two other movies to get her love and now they are doing it all over again. They didn’t need that aspect of the film. They had enough. MJ could have been the damsle in distress again without all the horseshit of them having to break up.

They didn’t need to bring up Uncle Ben again with “the real killer” Flint Marko (better known as The Sandman) escaping out of prison. I also felt that the special effects for Sandman weren’t nearly as good as the special effects on Doc Ock which were flawless in my opinion. Sandman was a waste but the biggest waste was on Venom who was there for like five minutes and he looked like a clown! They totally did not handle Venom the way that they should have. I also have my problems with Harry Osborne/ New Goblin as I feel that they should have left him a bad guy instead of making the ending a tag team effort and making wonder why I was watching the adventures of shark boy and lava girl. Also, Melissa said the greatest comment when Sandman was huge (he was just as big as a building at one point) she said, “Its the Stay puffed Marshmellow man!” she then quickly looked around and said “I bet that none of these kids here know who that is…” (Ungrateful little yuppie larva!)

I still feel that they just had ideas for scenes and just put them all together. I don’t feel as if it were made as smoothly (and with as much TLC) as 2 was. Two was great. I hate being biased towards a movie. I never cared for the first one but felt that 2 was what the first one should have been. I felt that the best scene in any Spiderman movie was the train chase in 2 and what was missing in 3 was something to compare to that and nothing it had came close to it. I don’t blame Sam Raimi (the director) for it. I feel that the presure was set so high to finish a movie by a certain date that (along with the fact that I read it somewhere–probably Entertainment Weekly that) they didn’t have time to finish a script before they had to start shooting. They were litterally writing the script as they were doing it. Sony wanted it done yesterday and there just wasn’t any way for them to do it.

I also feel that they rushed this film. They probably (and most likely) felt as if this were truly the last one that they should make it the biggest one and put in it as much as they could. It kind of ended the way Rome (the series on HBO) ended. The final two episodes took place years later from the previous couple of shows and they sped things up so much that you didn’t even know what was going on. If they were smart they would have made the last two episodes its on season (a third season) and allowed for characters to change on their own and not be rushed (I still feel as if there are a few episodes missing, people don’t change that fast and it is confusing for an audience to care about characters and things in those ways). They wanted to do so much in 3 that they threw everything and the kitchen sink in it just to make it the biggest and the best. I’ll say it was the biggest, but it was no where near the best. I didn’t care for the way the crowd reacted, in the movie, to Spiderman, it was the same way as in Batman and Robin when Batman and Robin were at some charity event. Batman and Robin don’t do charity events, perhaps Spiderman would, but I felt that they should have kept the crowd out of it as much as possible and leave it to the story. I thought a lot of things were too cheesy, some things were just way too dorky and forced on humor.

I’m actually being a lot more negative than I wanted to be but there were just some things that irked me heavily. I wish they had chases instead of fights. I didn’t care for Spiderman and Sandman’s first encounter. I think there should have been more to it. A chase dammit. The beginning of the movie is great. There is a nice build up before the first confrontation between Peter and Harry on the Goblin’s board in mid air. That was probably the best fight in my opinion. I actually cared!!! I wish that the film had some more of those nice shots of Spiderman gliding above streets in between buildings like they had in one and two. It just felt very rushed. They had enough material here for two movies.

If this is the last one, I’m fine with it. If there is a fourth one, just have one villian or just two, not three! (four if you count Spiderman’s dark side).

After all this negative talk, here is the rating:

First lets give Spiderman 1 a rating; I give Spiderman a:

Thumb Up: Good

The first one, while I didn’t care for it, wasn’t terrible and enjoyable. The damn thing made sense!

Spiderman 2:

Two Thumbs Up: Great!!!

Now this may come as a shocker, after all of my ranting, Spiderman 3:

Thumb Up: Good

That’s right, I’m giving it the same thumb rating as the first one. It was fun to watch. Would I buy it on DVD? Yeah, but like the other ones, I’d wait till it was on sale at Blockbuster used. I wouldn’t go out and buy it new on the day that it comes out. And with that said, here’s the second part of the rating for Spiderman 3:

Rent or On Demand Worthy=Good but not that good

I’d watch it again, on DVD or on TV, I wouldn’t go out of my way to see it again. But I’d see it again. Perhaps even enjoy it better a second time without the presure of wanting to enjoy it.

Next up! I want to see 28 Weeks Later and PIRATES 3!!!!

–Socram