Battle of the Spider-Man Movies

The Amazing Spider-Man (TASM), starring Andrew Garfield (the cute guy from The Social Network who isn’t a twin) and Emma Stone (if you kill someone can you become them? Because, then seriously, she better watch out), recently opened. Yay for gritty reboots, right? I mean, it worked for Batman. Not too much for Snow White, but whatever, we’ll take what we can get. How does it measure up against 2002’s Spider-Man (SM)?

The Amazing Spider-Man wins. It’s not even close. Don’t believe me? Let’s take a totally scientific and no-way biased look. And, obviously, spoiler alert.

Plot

Well, for starters, these are comic book movies. So who really cares about the plot as long as there are explosions and hot people in spandex? I’d say SM was more explode-y. TASM tried to introduce something about Spider-man’s family, which it didn’t really follow through on, and SM went old school with the “With great power comes great responsibility” bit. I say we stop the madness and forgo the backstory all together–wouldn’t it be awesome if some super hero movies started with super heroes being super heroes and not waste an hour of screen time on radio active animal bites/alien space rocks/parents being murdered? No one cares! Well, I guess a few movies do–The Incredibles and Mystery Men. So, both Spider-Man movies get -10 points for beating a dead horse.

Anyway, SM followed the traditional path. Amazing…well pretty much did too, except the colors were a little darker so everyone would know it was the “gritty” version. So, the score is still tied. But TASM gets +10 points for referencing Halloween when the Lizard was looking for Gwen Stacy in the closet. And TASM takes the lead.

Spider-Men

Toby Maquire was a bigger nerd, which I guess fits the Peter Parker role better, so +15 points for SM. Go you! But Andrew Garfield is more attractive, and I’d rather spend my $13 seeing him than Toby Maguire (even if we adjusted for ticket inflation). So +25 points for TASM. Yay for subjectivity!

MJ vs. Gwen

I do no like Kirsten Dunst or anything she stands for. (Except for bringing the phrase “It’s already been broughten” into our lexicon. I thank her for that.) And, as implied, I have a bit of a girl-crush on Emma Stone. But, OK, if we’re going by characters, Gwen Stacy was smarter. And more helpful–she was able to save the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Secret of the Ooze from rolling off the building. (Seriously, I can’t be the only one who thought that. Check out the picture of the turtles holding the Ooze and tell me it’s not the same as the antidote Gwen had to get.) MJ got that iconic kiss with Spider-Man, but Gwen wore cuter boots. Obviously, I’m going to award +10 points to TASM, just because I’m gong to associate her with The Ninja Rap from now on, and that’s just awesome.

Villians

The Green Goblin in SM was a little freaky, but pretty cartoony. The Lizard was also a little freaky. The CGI was kind of bad for both, but considering SM came out 10 years earlier before TASM, I guess I’ll have to give it to SM. So +10 points.

Following the comic book.

I don’t read comic books. This one’s a draw: +5 points for both.

Propaganda

Yes, yes. SM came out a year after 9-11. So it really shouldn’t be faulted for it’s blatant use of propaganda. On the other hand, really? Sorry, Spidey, going to have to deduct -50 for that.

As you can see, TASM is the clear winner. (And I didn’t even go into the other categories that TASM was clearly the winner in–Stan Lee Cameos, Movie Stars in Supporting Roles, Use of a City Full of Kurt Cobain Wannabes as Muggers…)

What do you think? Did you like The Amazing Spider-Man better than Spider-Man?

-Jessica Fiur