f13.net

In theaters July 7, 2017.

Teaser (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbLP_SmhtuM)

Trailer #1 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrzXIaTt99U)

International Trailer #1 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41dUp3kK-0w)

"So how are we going to outdo the train-stopping scene?"

"How about a boat?"

 :why_so_serious:

Really, I'm over SpiderMan movies. Even though Marvel's got him now and needs to fold him into the story, it still feels like an origin movie with Iron Man telling him to lay low, etc.

You'd think I'd be over them too, but really not.

Your love for Spidey far exceeds mine. I await the next Strange movie and Guardians.

Seems a lot more interesting now that it's tied in with the Marvel film universe. We'll see how the movie itself works out but it's raised expectations.

I don't even like the character of Spider-Man (at least not the classic version - the new philanthropic billionaire Peter Parker Spider-Man I dig) and I loved this trailer. It looks like they are kind of merging the Peter Parker character with the Miles Morales supporting cast (his buddy is like Ganke Lee come to life). The Vulture looks cool which should be impossible.

So Batman is now ...Birdman? :why_so_serious:

I'm ok with this.   :drill:

The Vulture seems actually scary, which really does seem impossible.

Spider-Man has always felt to me like a character who should be in a super-hero *universe*--he doesn't make sense by himself. So that much is right. I kind of hope they extend that further: I would love for cameos from Daredevil or Luke Cage, where Spider-Man becomes the glue that holds it all together, the guy who can go from fighting space gods to muggers and make sense in both contexts.

Some of the rest of it felt a bit, "yeah, ok", not making me feel huge anticipation.

The movies are not going to acknowledge the TV shows at all.

You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain.

As long as it has Iron Man hitting on Aunt May I am for this movie  :why_so_serious:

Disturbing lack of Marisa Tomei in the trailer. Whenever she is not on screen, other characters should be saying "Where is Marisa Tomei?"

Just back from seeing Spider-Man.

Big disappointment.

I'm sitting here quite unhappy at it all.  I'm sure a thread will pop up sooner or later.

I guess I'm not surprised.  The initial trailer looked very good, but then each following trailer felt more off.

I'd love to hear more.  I'm seeing mixed reviews now - some love, some hate.  I predict I'll be disappointed as I'm looking for the Spider-man of the 1980s to reach the screen and this doesn't sound like him at all.  Too many missing pieces, too many additions to the lore, and too many revisions (Flash).

I saw an ad for it last night on youtube, and Spider-man annoyed the fuck out of me.

I'll post up a dissection once im out of this training. The more I thought about it in bed last night the more annoyed I got.

It has that. Also, everyone hitting on aunt may. Even me at one point. All of which also didn't work.

As someone who got into comics very specifically through Spider-man, I'll say that this movie had a couple of the most Spider-man moments that I've seen in the movies.

It does.  Would have been even better had it been a Spider-man movie, rather than probably the 2nd worst of the Iron Man movies.

 :why_so_serious:

In the past 12 hours I've seen a bunch of additional reviews and all but one were positive.  A lot of people are saying they nailed Peter, they nailed the teen Spidey becoming Spider-man, and that Keaton was amazing.  Do you disagree with those ideas, Ironwood?  Or were there other problems that ruined it for you?

Based on the last comment, "Too much goddamn Iron Man," which would be a valid criticism.  A cameo is OK, but several scenes from trailers have played-up Peter's angst over Tony not letting him be Spidey rather than the actual problems of Peter being Spidey. 

Plus the newest one where Tony steps out of an Iron Man suit to lecture Peter about whatever's happened. He only needed to be in the drop-off scene we saw in the first trailer, nowhere else. Adding more Iron Man might make it more marketable but it makes it less about Spidey because RDJ dominates all scene's he's in.

I'd say Iron Man should have much more than a cameo.  Early Amazing Spider-Man comics from the '60s had Peter being routinely mentored by the Avengers and Human Torch because he was considered too young to actually join a group of superheroes/fight crime since he was still in high school.  Since they're going with high school Peter Parker, Tony Stark filling that mentor role in this version makes a lot of sense and it helps to bring him into the MCU so it should be a prominent part of the movie.  It can still definitely be overdone though.

I can see where you're going with that, but to me that's the 2nd movie. The 1st is Spidey tries going on his own and fucks-up, then realizes he needs that mentoring. This would have been a good place to use Gwen Stacey for that transition, but that story's shot because of Sony.

That movie needed to happen before he was in Captain America: Civil War.

So, it should be another origin movie?

I don't know that we needed another nother Spidey origin story, I'm just pointing out that once he met Iron Man the ship had kind of sailed on him doing his own thing. I suppose they could have set this one before CA:CW and have the movie end with the scene where he meets IM in CA:CW, but I don't think that's the route they went.

For a movie that's over two hours, there's maybe about 15 minutes of Iron Man. Tony is ok with Peter being Spider-man (hence giving him a suit) but doesn't want him trying to take on too much while he's inexperienced and isn't ready to make him an Avenger. It mostly makes sense given where Tony's character is at right now.

Peter is a 15 year old who has gotten a taste of being an Avenger. He wants to do more than fight local crime but the reality is that he's still learning how to be a superhero and his attempts at doing more have consequences. His motivations mostly make sense as well.

It's a Spider-man movie that takes place in the context of a MCU that had been going on without him all this time. It's a somewhat different kind of Spider-man movie, although he still has to juggle his crime fighting life with his school life and as is typical fails at that frequently. I strongly disagree with the notion that this is an Iron Man movie though.

For those that have seen it: Would it have been better with a nod to the origin, even if it was just flashbacks in the credits (like they did with the Norton Hulk movie)?

I don't need to see Uncle Ben shot a third time in 15 years, no. The spider gets a brief mention.

Ok, so random thoughts then in no particular order.

Firstly, it's important for y'all to remember how much I fucking loved both Peter and Spidey in Civil War.  Please, bear it in mind because it really made me both want this film and for this film to be good.  I now have the option of seeing it again with Elena and, here's the kicker :  I don't want to.  It was boring.  I don't want to be bored again.

So, yeah, those going in wanting 'something different than the usual Marvel Fare', well, you might just like this.  It's a high school movie.  It's barely a superhero movie.  Which is fine, you know, didn't bother me, I'm up for that because they're taking Peter back to his start and we're getting him started up again, fine that's ok.   So we see that he has a bit of a shit school life.  That's fair and true, so good on that.  He's also got spidey stuff stashed around school, ok, that works too.  He's a fucking genius and a nerd and, by the way, did we mention a genius ?  So that's great too.  So far, so setup by Civil War.

(Honorable mention here ;  ALLLL the fucking teachers in that school were awesome, especially Gilfoyle.  The tech teacher was particularly funny, or maybe you guys know it as wood shop or what the fuck ever.  So, we see Peter making webbing in chem, we see him fucking around making gadgets, kinda, and that's fine.)

But here's where the film falls down - wanna hear ?  Do you ?  Read on.


So Tony Stark gives him a suit.  And it's utter bullshit.  Utter fucking bullshit because this Suit can basically be Spider-Man.  The fucking fat kid could have worn this suit and been Spider man, kinda.  It was bullshit.  And we see tons of this fucking suit.  And tons of what it can do.  And tons of the gadgets that it has.  And then it becomes sentient (no, fucking really) and has the voice of Jennifer Connolly.  No.  Really.  Someone fucking stop me.  And the suit has 500 combinations of webbing, which is bullshit.  And Spider Man doesn't have to do fucking shit at this point except be a high school kid and, frankly, it fucking sucks.

And please DON'T tell me that because of what happened at the end that makes the point of the suit.  Please, save your fucking breath because the suit sucked fucking balls.


You know how in Civil War, there was all the trash talk and Spidey goodness of talking smack while fighting and all that ?  Yeah.  There's almost fucking none of that.  And Vulture is great (no, seriously, Keaton is fucking great in this), but it's also AoS bullshit and Tony Stark Bullshit because he doesn't give a fuck about Spidey until he does and Spidey is just trying to prove a point to Tony and Stark and tony stark tony starkt, toonyonatnaotnaosnsnatpnastatrkatnasktnatntaktnatan and Robert Fucking Downey Fucking Junior and FUCK OFF OUT MY FUCKING FILM AND STOP WITH THE CAP CAMEOS TOO AND FUCK OFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF.

Also, Aunt May is fucking ludicrous and you know what REALLY, REALLY, REALLY BUGGED ME ?

They don't talk about the Origin at all.  Now, I don't want an origin story, I don't care, but they don't talk about it at ALL.  Like, as if they have been legally BARRED.
They say 'I got bit by a spider' so that's fine.  But if they mention Ben in anything more than a word, I missed it.  And May at one point FREAKS THE FUCK OUT and WE ALL KNOW WHY BUT THE FILM DOESN'T.  And that's a fucking PROBLEM BECAUSE THE FILM ACTS LIKE IT CAN'T SAY SHIT OR DOESN'T WANT TO SAY SHIT AND IT ALL FALLS DOWN.

And then the big spoiler happens and it's actually big and then right at the end of the film the other spoiler happens and it's actually big, but meanwhile you've been FUCKING BORED.

And the fight scenes are dark and fast and jerky and FUCKING SUCK.

It's an ok movie.  I don't want to see it again.  I wish it had been a good movie.

It fucking wasn't.

See, that sounds like what I expected. Tony should absolutely not be willing to let Peter off the leash and Peter should be straining against it. Him accepting he needs the mentoring comes with age, experience, and another 'oh I dun fucked up' moment a-la Ben. You don't need to see Tony for that story to happen. Drop him off after the airport fight, tell him you'll be in touch and to keep it on the down-low. Done.  

Then show up again at the end, after the fuck-up. Tony says how Peter needs to listen and the mentor pairing with the Avengers happens after Infinity War. (Which is the next Phase http://www.denofgeek.com/uk/movies/marvel-cinematic-universe/50488/avengers-4-will-end-marvel-s-original-22-movie-story-arc )

I'm just going based on what IW said and the trailers. They're featuring RDJ too much in the marketing, IMO, so combined with IW's comment of "Iron Man Movie" I extrapolated.

Sounds like you've seen the movie Merusk.  And might I recommend that you just keep that in your head and avoid it.  Because it'll be better in your head.

Because Fuck Tony Stark.

Also, fuck Happy Fucking Hogan while we're about it.

Jesus.  And fucking Pepper.  Fuck OFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF.

Hah, shit, and I wrote that before your random thoughts post.

The suit sounds like utter, total garbage. It's like Marvel was forced to go with a Sony idea. We saw the Rhino at the end of AS2 and all the goddamn animal suits. Keaton obviously has a Vulture suit, so sure, a fucking Spider suit.

Goddamn.

Except the suit can't be Spider-man. Just about any time Peter tries to rely on the suit's abilities it doesn't work out for him. Tony developed it as the kind of thing he would use himself but Peter isn't particularly successful as Spider-man until he doesn't have the suit (once he's essentially no longer trying to be Iron Man and is able to just be Spider-man).

TBF, the suit sounds like a lot of what they are doing with Peter Parker's suit in the comics now, I.E. Peter is now Tony Stark with a conscience and less caring about pussy and profit and more about helping people. So his company makes all these gadgets and all the gadgets are in the really cool suit. Sounds like they wanted to have their cake (Peter Parker in high school) and eat it too (Spider-Man has all this great gear despite it not being any of his idea).

Yeah, I addressed your point.   :why_so_serious:  (Edit ;  that was for Velorath)

There is a LOT good about this movie, btw.  If anyone wants to know that, let me know.

Also, guess what I'm watching right now ?  The Spider Man stuff in Civil War.

Why did it all go so adrift ?

Hay guYs! !hat if the suit goes crazy in the next movie because Peter rejected it, turns black, and bonds with a body builder! Whats Arnie doing these days...  :why_so_serious:

Jennifer Fucking Connolly.

Also, he takes on Winter Solider, Falcon and Cap with no trouble, but Mike Keaton gives him bother.  Nope.

It's a little different when the people you're fighting are fine with killing you.

It sounds like the ending needs to pay off these complaints and I'm not clear if it does based upon the above.  I don't want to know, either, until I see it so this is the last time I visit this thread until I have seen it.

Based upon the trailer, I expect this to be a story of Spider-kid coming of age and saying, "No.  With great Power comes great responsibility.  Great responsibility means I have to be responsible for my own junk, not beholden to surrogate negligent father Stark or Happy Hogan.  I am Spider-man.  I have to choose.  I have to live up to this responsibility as I see fit.  I can't sit on the sidelines because Stark thinks I am not ready if I have the power to make a difference." 

I do not know if that is the end or not, but it was the end I expected this to build towards. 

That's really not true. The Human Torch and Spider-Man were routinely portrayed as being exactly the same age, and their friendship/rivalry was about that. Reed Richards called Spider-Man "son" in their first meeting, but he called everyone but Ben Grimm, Thor and Sue Richards "son" or "youngster". (He had different condescending words for Sue.)  The first time the Avengers met Spider-Man, it was not really Spider-Man, but some robot duplicates of him (don't ask) but the real Spider-Man showed up and saved their bacon, and I don't recall that any of them were particularly "you're too young for this, sonny jim". Generally the only people who treated Spidey as obviously young and maybe taking risks he shouldn't take were mentor figures like Gwen Stacy's dad.

Not that I mind the take, but one of the distinctive things about early Ditko-Lee Spidey is that nobody really mentors him. That's why he's kind of a hard-luck character--he's having to deal with his struggles all by himself, and he frequently has to deal with other superheroes assuming that he's a bad guy because of the Daily Bugle's relentless attacks on him. It's really not until the character's been around for a long time and become kind of the company mascot that other heroes come to regard him with affection, and that's generally a peer relationship--if you look at the 15-year plus run of Marvel Team-Up, I think the only guys who call Spider-Man "kid" or "youngster" are Ben Grimm, Doctor Strange and Captain America, who generally feel 'older' than the average Marvel hero anyway. Even Iron Man generally just refers to Spidey as a peer, more or less. The other thing that goes along with this is that Spider-Man is a really weird combination of loner and partner to the entire Marvel Universe--until much later, all of them talk about how nobody really knows Spidey well etc. compared to how well the Avengers, X-Men and FF know each other, and I think there's actually no other heroes who know his identity for a very long time.

This was great, highly recommend, will probably watch again.

I give it a thumbs up.  Certain things didn't sit well with me (Flash revisions, Aunt May jokes, lack of great in combat banter, that final Peter Parker moment), and I missed some things that I think should have been there (lack of Osborn, no pictures of Ben even, Netflix has given us a better NY street level environment), but it was a good MCU Spider-man film featuring the kid looking to be accepted. 

Sony should be talking to Marvel and Netflix about tying the Netflix shows into Movie 2 or 3.  If they'd twisted the post credit scene and name checked Fisk....

I can possibly get the reason behind the lack of osbourne, as that angle has been played to death in every other spiderman movie, so they might not have wanted to do it.  Though they could have had oscorp logo cameos or something out there to indicate that it is still a thing.

Another one that struck me as sort of odd, was as far as i could tell, no sign of the Daily Bugle, unless I missed it in passing in a quick newspaper shot somewhere.  Then again, I don't really see them using Jameson as a foil for spiderman quite yet, as he is still in highschool, and I dont think he would even have his bugle photo gig untill his early college days.

Flash didn't bother me that much. There is nothing saying that they always have to play him as the Jock character, just the arrogant bully type who is always messing with parker.

Not sure about name checking Fisk, as I think they would need more setup than that, but I do recall Tooms name dropping someone in regards to one of his remaining weapon deals partway through the movie, though I don't recall who.  Maybe they might do something with that?

Last thing for anyone who has also seen it, did anyone manage to make out what the text of the PS was at the end of the note he left on the pile of stuff after the final fight scene?  It went by too fast for me to catch.

Personally if I had any one thing to nitpick about during the entire movie, it would be the scene where parker outs himself to his friend who catches him sneaking into his room in full costume.  The kid drops that gigantic lego deathstar almost directly in the centre of the room, and somehow, nobody manages to step on a single piece of goddamned lego for the entire duration of that scene?  I was like, wtf?  There were at least 4 times where peter would have had to walk right through the mess, and absolutely no reaction.  Totally ruined my immersion. :awesome_for_real:

Can't spoil that sweet product placement deal by hinting Lego could hurt you anywhere except in your pocket.  :grin:

I enjoyed it. Not in the upper echelon of Marvel movies but entertaining enough.

Just dropped in to say just saw it, loved it from the opening credits (they got the theme music!) all the way through to the final PSA. Don't know what's wrong with Ironwood, but this was the Spider Man I wanted to see.

Oh, Tony did make the point that Cap could have put Peter down anytime. He was trying not to hurt him (which is what I remember from the movie too).

Anyway, won't stick around to argue the point, opinions being opinions, but if you think you might like it, you might want to go see it yourself and give it a chance.
Apparently Spider Man is one of those things like iced tea -- everybody has got their mind set on what makes it good, and that's just that.

So, this was fun and decent, which most Marvel movies, really--they have a kind of efficient house style that mostly avoids badness but also usually misses greatness. Maybe that's just going to happen with the source material--there is only so great it can be.

I did have one huge problem with the movie that did intrude on my enjoyment of it. I'm totally fine with skipping the origin story altogether, with only the briefest of mentions, except for one thing. You don't have to re-show Uncle Ben dying any more than you have to show Batman's parents getting killed. We know it. But you do need to retain Peter's sense of guilt and responsibility because of it--he needs to always be thinking, "If I don't try to stop the bad guys when I can, I might be responsible for another death that I could have prevented". That's fundamental to the character--it's his key motivation that drives him on. But this Peter is kind of just motivated be derring-do and hero worship, for the most part. He needs to be pushing the envelope to do more because he wants to do better on the responsibility front. For that reason, I also really wish:



As long as I'm at it on Iron Man, though,

Which was one of my main criticisms - The movie accepts things it hasn't shown in any way.  No-one at school ever, ever, ever wonders how Peter's doing with the horrible death of his Uncle. No-one even once checks Flash as being a literal slime of a human being.  Liz even says at the end 'I don't know what's wrong with you', like having a intimacy issue after the death of a relative isn't the most common thing in the goddamn world.  And let's make May a neurotic mentalcake with no idea why.  It's a mess and it's a mess that most of the fans won't notice because they backfill the shit they wanna see in there because they know how it is.  It truly shines when it takes some chances, but it only does that about ... twice ?  Maybe 3 times ?

Sure, the emotional reaction Pete has to the Ferry Fuckup is great, but doesn't 'go' anywhere.

Still disappointed.

Also, yes, The Avengers is now apparently Tony, Pepper and Happy.   :why_so_serious:

And the Vision. He has a room.

I don't think the movie is great, but I don't have any big issues with it. And I like you Ironwood and I don't have any issue with you not liking the movie but:


That is coming dangerously close to saying that it's a bad movie but you're one of the few people that can see through it and see what a mess it is. You comment on other people filling things themselves, but at the same time one of your issues is that you're bringing your own baggage from the comics in regards to how the Uncle Ben stuff is handled (or more specifically how Peter's guilt over Ben's death should inform his character). You're at least partially judging the film based on what you think it should have been rather than what it is.

The thing is, unless a super-hero movie just wants to be either a) a series of great action set-pieces with a basically bland but familiar protagonist (e.g., the superhero equivalent of James Bond) or it is some kind of metacommentary *on* superheroes (Deadpool), then whether it's a good or even great film is going to come down to: does this character have a distinctive motivation for doing stuff that's basically kind of insane and/or dangerous?

MCU characters:

Captain America: yes, they've done a great job of giving him motivations that go beyond being 'bland patriot guy'.
Thor: some sibling rivalry, some daddy issues,  some need for humilitity in Thor, decent but not great. "Love for Jane Foster", transparently *not* convincing.
Guardians of the Galaxy: every single one of them except maybe Gamora has a blazingly clear and kind of interesting motivation (Gamora's is clear but until we learn more about Thanos, it's lacking)
Iron Man: crystal-clear in IM 1; weak in 2 (and thus a weak movie); mixed in 3 (and thus a mixed movie).
Of the characters who haven't held movies up in their own right (or the ambiguous case of the Hulk): decent motivations, a bit less clear
Doctor Strange: basically borrowing Movie Tony Stark's motivations to try them on

Spider-Man, though, has got the most famous motivations in the world except for Batman, and it's a major *story engine* for him at all stages. Making him just a junior-league Avengers wannabe who is in high school leaves some of the most interesting aspects of the character on the cutting board.

We just got a couple Spider-man movies where over the course of two movies he ended up with three deaths to feel guilty about. If they want to downplay that aspect of the character a bit this time around I'm ok with it. We know he has a stong sense of responsibility here. Part of the reason he keeps going after the Vulture is because he doesn't think Tony is taking the threat seriously (and he tells Tony as much after the ferry battle which is when Tony tells Peter he's the one that contacted the Feds). It's not just an audition for the Avengers, and even his desire to join the Avengers seems to stem from a genuine desire to use his powers for good. He got a taste of being trusted with a lot of responsibility and then was left feeling cast aside, ignored, and treated like a kid when he was no longer needed. It's a motivation that probably feels relatable to a lot of people.

Beyond that, one of the things that makes him fairly distinctive in the MCU and comic movies in general is that Peter doesn't kill his villain off (quite the opposite in fact). Even Batman in the Nolan films was 2 for 6 on keeping his antagonists alive.

I wish they'd just given us one friggin minute of Ben. One dream sequence.  One flashback.  Cut scenes in the credits.  Something.  Spidey without any Ben is like Pizza without cheese.  It might still taste good - but it isn't pizza.

Why though?  As has been mentioned before, the Spiderman Origin story has been done to death so many times damn near everybody old enough to watch this thing probably knows it by heart already.  At this point, it is an inherent part of his character.  We don't need that exposition yet again.   It would be about as dumb as having Tony Stark announce, at least once, in every movie that he is, infact, Iron Man.  We already know this.

In the first Batman movie it was done much better. It started off with the audience assumed to know that the Guy is batman, and you only say "the origin" at the beginning of the third act, and that was to show the Joker as the killer. I'm really surprised gthat other movies didn't take their queue from that... but I guess lazy writers have to fill time somehow.

No, your first line is bullshit, as I'm sure you're aware.  You should know better ;  I'm not here to tell other people how to think or that I'm the rightest person they'll ever meet and show BOW IN SUBJUGATION.  Don't do that.

I'm not 'partially' judging anything.  I'm IN TOTALITY judging it for that.  Because what you seem to be saying is that I should ignore that it's a Spider-Man Movie.  I can't really do that.  I have certain expectations of a Spider-Man movie, as everyone else does, I would imagine.  One of those is that the motivation of Peter Parker is a little more clearly stated and conveyed better than it was here.  If I'm guilty of that (and, as I say, I am and have owned it since I first fucking posted here) so be it.  I think it was a good movie.  I've said so.  What I'm grappling to explain is why I'm so very disappointed in it for what I was expecting.  I said that from the first. 

But this isn't just an 'Uncle Ben' thing.  The discussion seems to have turned in that direction, but it's not really about that, as such.  I would just have liked the movie to be clearer on WHY everyone was reacting to an off-screen happening that's not once mentioned.  It would be like watching Shawshank but they never talk even tangentially about the two girls that were murdered.  It makes a LOT less sense.  I don't need to see an old guy snuff it.  I don't need to see agony and anguish about it (because we did get a fair bit of that).  But what I would like to see is characters ON SCREEN who are at least aware of it.  I challenge you to put someone down in front of it who has no clue about Spider-Man at all and paint me a motivation that gels with WHY Peter originally became Spider-Man as a character.  I'll even throw in the Civil War scenes.  I put it to you that you'd probably be surprised both by the result and by the fact that you managed to find someone who has no clue about Spider-Man after all these fucking movies and tie ins.   :grin:

As I say, this isn't my only disappointment and, frankly, it's the least of them.  I hated the suit and the amount of time devoted to the suit.  I hated Stark and the amount of time devoted to Stark.  I thought the fight scenes were fast, flashy, overly dark (I mean physically dark, it was hard to see shit) and more importantly, the Spider-Man banter, so brilliantly present in Civil War, was entirely absent during costumed scenes.

There was also tons to love about it, frankly a lot more to love than my meanderings might suggest, though I've mentioned it now 3 times.  What bothered me was coming out of it thinking 'Yeah, that should have been a lot better' rather than 'Wheeeeeeee'.  Is that a personal thing ?  Of course it fucking is.

Look, Imma gonna give up now, since I don't think I can be any clearer.

I wouldn't have said it if I thought it was bullshit. I'm not here to score points in a conversation about a movie I don't have particularly strong feelings about, and I didn't preface it the way I did to blow smoke up your ass. I genuinely respect you, and a comic book movie generally isn't something I want to create a heated argument about. I could quote what you wrote again, but I'll trust that if you care enough you'll reread it yourself and possibly see what prompted the response I gave. I don't think it was an intentional attempt at sounding superior but I do think it came across as condescending.

Beyond that, I don't have any actual problems with your complaints about the movie and I don't think you were being unclear with them. I don't have issues with Peter's motivations or the suit, but yeah that's personal opinion. What kept this movie from being great for me is that I don't think there were more than a couple moments that really stood out. It's kinda funny, but not as funny as some of the best MCU movies. The action is serviceable but we've seen a lot better. Keaton might be the best villain the MCU has had (partly because the villains have been the weakest part of the MCU), but none of the other performances really stood out. Its niche in the MCU is that this is the one about a high school kid. That's fine and it's a pleasant enough movie to me, but if not for the fact that it's the movie that I've watched in the last week that other people are talking about I wouldn't even be posting about it here.

Spidey banters pretty well when he's fighting the guys at the ATM. There's a lot of good humor generally in the movie.

I don't need Ben in flashback or even his name mentioned. I just need Peter to have a reason to go on besides "I want to impress Tony Stark".

And I really disliked the one Stark speech. It's important that Peter be able to recognize his own mistakes--and to fret about them. That's what he does.

I didn't mind the suit elements overall. It was a clever way almost to get "thought bubbles" into a film.

It would have been nice to show something about Ben but i don't feel it was necessary at all to make the movie good.  This is spiderman has already been at it for a while, long enough to get noticed and recruited by Tony for Civil War, so it stands to figure that Ben has been dead a while also.  It would have been nice to get a mention like they did with the spider bite as a nod to the fans, but it didn't take away from the movie.

Wasn't bad, but I agree with some of the suit criticisms. Then again, nearly everything we saw on the suit was something Peter had done in the past, so my biggest problem there is Stark now gets credit instead of equally-smart Peter.


Ben should have at least had a mention. This is still less than a year after Ben's death according to the timeline established in Civil War. Peter's been Spidey for 6 months when Tony recruits him. He explicitly says so: (2:23) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OnOJSNktOs  and that's at the start of this film. Yet there's no mention, no pictures, no memories?  That's bullshit. This is the most valid criticism of the whole movie; ignoring that its story driver was "Just another Teen Movie."

Ironwood is 100% dead-on here. The audience is assumed to have a level of knowledge and the movie lets you infill gaps because of it. Is that a bad thing or a good thing is a judgement call for each viewer. It's definitely not a "good film" thing. Hardcore SW fans loved a lot of things in Phantom Menace, but not knowing the background for all of the politics and intrigue makes it a worse movie than the dialog and lack of action. The same can be said here.

It's not a bad film, but it's not Spider Man to me because of the things Marvel has dropped 1) to distance themselves from Sony 2) to avoid yet another origin movie. Had they decided Spidey had been street-level for a year or two when they brought him into Civil War (making him a Junior/ Senior in HS) it would have been better. We all know the origin, so I agree there's no reason to have a 3rd in 20 years.

However, that doesn't mean you just ignore the things that SHOULD be happening from a character-perspective because the audience is familiar with them. When you do that you've decided that the only important part is the spectacle. That's fine if it's the direction you want to go, but it makes your entire franchise candy floss like Transformers and Marvel had been keeping away from that until recently.

There wasn't *enough* banter, but the ATM banter was good. There could have been more during the Vulture vs Spidey and Spidey vs. the Goons fights. Since it's early in his career the bumbling was OK with me, even though it's counter to the whole "suddenly Peter was as agile and quick as a spider" tropes that have been in the comics and movies since the character's inception. (The cafeteria tray Spidey from 2000's wouldn't have stumbled awkwardly around trying to chase-down the van.)

Purely subjective of course, but I laughed a lot more at the humor in this one than, say, Ant Man. And I didn't think Ant Man was bad either, but Spidey's jokes seemed more in character for me. YMMV of course.

Some of the discussion here does show there's a fine line to walk when skipping the origin. I personally do already know all I need to know about what's been happening to Peter, if not from fifty years of comics then from five other movies in recent history. Hell, I didn't even think referencing the spider bite was necessary. So yeah, this fan is happy to fill in the backstory. And although I am sure there are some non-fans out there who can't, that's not who I hear complaining. I'm hearing fans who *do* know the backstory complaining because a favorite-absolutely-relevant-I-tell-you part was left out.

As to Tony, I don't have to tell people he's got issues, and indeed has judgement problems. I won't go so far as agree with a friend of mine that Stark is actually the overarching villain of the series and not Thanos, but I do agree he's got issues that didn't go away when he fixed his heart. I wouldn't be that surprised if he feels a bit threatened by Parker's inventive genius, and is using the gratuitous suit upgrades as a passive aggressive way of keeping the upper hand.

I like the "thought bubbles" way of seeing the talking suit, and it also is a way to add in a version of "spidey sense," which I notice was pretty much left out of this incarnation of Spider Man (for good reason, IMO).

I do approve of the stated goal of keeping Spidey more grounded than most of the MCU, in keeping with him being "The Friendly Neighborhood Spider Man," but I'm worried that's just bullshit. These are blockbuster summer movies, they are going to trend big -- if they were going to go the low(ish)key route they should have given him to Netflix. (I know, impossible from a politics/economic standpoint, but still I think it would have been better from a story development point of view -- but then I think that for all the properties.)

Personally, I want a Spiderman movie that's completely made up of Ben dying over and over, so we never have to see or talk about it again. I fuckin get it. And I don't read comics. If you aren't familiar enough with the shit by now, kick rocks.

Peter does mention his Spidey-Sense in Civil War and there's enough telegraphing in both Civil War and in this movie to suggest that the Spidey-Sense is alive and well.   I was ok with that.  After all, I really, really, really don't think we needed the bullshit slowdown nonsense we got in the first Spider-Man.  That was silly.  And, yes, I get that was what Raimi was going for, but it was too silly.


Here's a question for you though ;  I too had the suit as a way of allowing the huuuuuge amount of internal dialogue that Peter usually goes through, but what do we think of narration in movies ?  Is that an acceptable substitute and has it ever really been used where it worked ?  For the most part, these things get done by an external locus or having characters talk to themselves (Stark does a lot of both), but I'm always aware that a lot of comics rely on this and apart from Sin City, I've never really seen it done particularly well ?

Let's approach Ben from another angle:

What evidence is there as to whether this Peter Parker knows that he was responsible for Ben's death? If there is no evidence, was he responsible?

I'm betting Spidey 2 circles back to the origin when the guy that killed Ben is caught - and he then discovers that the guy was someone he could have stopped, but didn't.

Jesus.  Enough with Uncle Ben!  Enough time has passed for both Peter and May that it isn't awkward for either of them when strangers hit on Aunt May.  There's no, "She's marri--oh. *sadface*"  They are both apparently farther over his death than some of the audience.  Spiderman has enough distance to form a new character arc with new motivations rather than be stuck on the same damn trauma he was for the last 5 films.  Let it go.

I could really go for some rice about now.

 :roflcopter:

While I agree that they well may be going for "catching up" on the backstory in later installments, Bobthesomething's comment makes me question if Unka Ben even exists in this timeline (yet). There was one mention this movie something about "All the stuff Aunt May's had to go through recently" but has Ben even been mentioned by name? (Remember, I'm the guy who didn't remember The Milano being mentioned by name in GoTv2, -- it takes me a few viewthroughs to get all the details down, so I'm probably just not remembering it.)

If not, then maybe there will be no Uncle Ben to fuck up and get killed (Peter has to learn about the whole responsibility thing another way), or, maybe Aunt May hasn't married him yet. Could be a story arc in an upcoming movie where Aunt May meets some guy and ties the knot, Peter maybe doesn't even like him, and then fucks up and gets him killed.

As for narration in movies, I'm totally down with it. But then I would be...

Except it's not even necessary to fill in the gaps. There's nothing about "kid with superpowers wants to be a superhero" that actually requires a dead Uncle in his background.

Know what was fun? Watching windup defend the prequels from these same arguments.

know what's not? Watching them be defended the same way again.

"Kid with superpowers wants to be a superhero" is sufficient for Sky High and a zillion other movies. It's kind of underwhelming with a character who has the characterization cornucopia available with Spider-Man. It's really like saying, "Batman is a guy who likes to wear underwear on the outside so he can fight muggers". Like, ok? Sure? That would be fun? But you know, then he's not much different from Comet Man or Big Daddy or a zillion other characters. Being a totally fine generic superhero character who is vaguely comforting because you've seen his costume before seems a pointless waste of one of the four or five best character motivations in the genre.

Unless that motivation is thematically being tied into the story currently being told, no I don't really think it's that important. I'm rarely reading a Spider-man comic and in the back of my mind thinking "oh thats right, it's because he didn't stop the guy that ended up killing his Uncle that's motivating him to prevent the Sinster Six from launching a satellite filled with poison gas right now."

When you say that these are the best motivations in the genre, you should really stress the "in the genre" part. Seeing your parents gunned down in front of you isn't really motivation for dressing up in a bat costume and fighting crime at night. It's a genre convention but let's not pretend it's a beautiful piece of storytelling that can elevate a Batman story from being just another Superhero to a masterpiece through it's mere mention.

I'd argue that the heart of Spider-man isn't the Uncle thing, it's that especially at the time he was created, he was a character whose life only got harder from gaining superpowers. He struggled with real life problems while trying to juggle his two identities and especially in his superhero life, he used humor to help get himself through it. Getting those aspects right to me is a lot more important than the origin window dressing.

NO.

No, I'm sorry, you're not right.  I didn't wanna get into this again, but you're not right.

He was living it LARGE and happy before his Uncle Died.  For Fucks Sake, he was earning shitloads WRESTLING.  He could have been a lazy fuck that's also clever and made bank from his GENIUS inventions and wrestled on the side and had a penthouse and been HARRY for fucks sake.

NO.  BEN IS IMPORTANT.

Or at least the Power and Responsibility bit.  I mean, you have to ask yourself WHY in this version of the movie Peter is even doing any of this shit.  Sure, he wants to be an Avenger now, but he was fighting crime and helping people before Stark showed up.  He's clearly the genius that he was in the comics.  He's clearly made something that would have the average IP Lawyer creaming his jeans (so much so that Stark commented on it first).  Yet, he's still in a shitty apartment with his aunt helping old ladies for churros.  Why ?  It's important to know WHY.  If I had these powers I'd want to do the same thing - we all had that dream at his age;  but the cleverness of the comic and the character was pointing out to us every fucking issue that it's just NOT fun and games.  Being Spider-Man ruined Peter's life in some very, very, very important ways.  Annnnnnd, shit, I'm ranting.  Goddamn it, you got me monologuing again.  I hate you all.

Also, I'm always reading a Spider-Man comic with Uncle Ben in the back of my mind.  Because that's the point.  The Batman analogy upthread is Dead On The Money.  Without his parents slain, Batman is just a total fucking rich shithead who likes to punch hobos in his spare time

I disagree. I'm enjoying the conversation but not enough to give you aneurysm so I'll leave it at that.

I'm enjoying it too, don't stop on my account.  Anger is the default setting in Scotland, something more people would understand if they visited.   :why_so_serious:

Again, run it down like this.

Why does Thor do what he does? Because what he does is what he is. He's the Norse god of thunder, the heir to the throne, Daddy's Favorite, a warrior born. He's not an ordinary guy who gets superpowers, he's from a superpowered civilization. If he's in that poison gas control room, he fights on because that's his job and his nature.

Why does Captain America do what he does? He's got a great motivation too--and it's what makes him different from Spider-Man, even *if* they find themselves in that same control room filling with poison gas. He does it because first, he doesn't like bullies--he's been the weaker man. But also, because honor and duty.

Why does the Hulk do what he does? He can't help it. Because he's a monster with a human being trapped inside. Really different if he is in that room with poison gas--he fights on because he's fucking angry.

Why does Iron Man do what he does? Because he's trying to prove he's smarter, sexier and more foresighted than *anyone* else. So he fights on in the poison gas room because fuck if he's going to let the Sinister Six show him up.

Why does Ant-Man do what he does? Because he's a decent guy who is in over his head and kind of got tricked into this anyway. He'd probably rather get away from the poison gas room if he can and just let someone else handle those guys, but if there's no way out besides beating them--or if they're threatening the place where his daughter lives--he'll put in some more effort.

Why does Scarlet Witch do what she does? She doesn't really know herself at this point. For her brother? To make up for doing bad things in the past? She'll fight on out of self-preservation and maybe loyalty to Captain America, but not a lot of certainty. If the bad guys can get away, she might not feel too personally obsessed with nailing them all, unless they really annoy her or insult her personally.

Every one of those scenes is *different*, and it's not just the kinetics of the superpowers involved. So it matters a LOT that Peter would be there because he felt obliged to, and that he'll keep fighting even when he should probably give up and leave it to someone else because he's afraid of what will happen if he lets those guys go. He'll take risks and suffer where the other guys might not, to the point of being kind of dumb about it.

And it's exactly what Ironwood said: without that sense that he's got something to make up for, Peter would be having fun and making money. He'd be off in Silicon Valley at 16, impressing women with his physical abilities, and so on. You can look at the motivations chart and see who the guys are who couldn't give it up: Captain America, Thor; the guys who might actually give it up: Iron Man, Ant-Man, Scarlet Witch; the guys who want to give it up but aren't able to: Hulk. Spider-Man has a really distinctive place in there--he's always tempted to give it up but he won't let himself. That's a precious story-telling engine.

 :heart:

Ben wasn't important enough to diminish my enjoyment of the movie in any way, wasn't important enough to even notice that he hadn't been mentioned at all until someone pointed it out. 

so

i didn't know rdj was in this movie so i'm going to see it and probably like it (but not pay for it)

however, there is nothing - absolutely nothing - dumber than comic book canon

these writers literally make this shit up on the fly, otherwise reboots wouldn't be the expectation with these characters

uncle ben was important once. he's not important now.

who gives a fuck

There are two constants in the comic book universe and they relate to motivations:  The Waynes and Uncle Ben are dead.  Their deaths motivate their hero. Without that, they're someone else.

counterpoint: there are no constants in comic books and nothing matters

So Uncle Ben is Poochie?

"Whenever Poochie is not on screen, all of the other characters must ask, 'Where's Poochie?'"


Seriously, just because Uncle Ben isn't mentioned explicitly in this one film doesn't mean he has been written out.  We can see Peter still retains his Responsibility Quotient by his obsessive need to get dangerous guns off the street.  "If you're going to shoot at someone, shoot at me."  This is not a kid just fucking around for the lulz.  Give him some credit: Peter's got object permanence down. 

If its such a constant why does it need to be brought up at all? unless we see Uncle Ben running around alive and well the constant is assumed, there is zero need to bring it up.

 :Love_Letters: :Love_Letters: :Love_Letters:

Saw this on the weekend. Loved it. I have comic book fatigue but enjoyed it immensely and stayed awake the whole film (that's basically a two thumbs up from me).

Some great laughs throughout the movie. A+ screen time from Cap and Hannibal Burress.

But to say that a character has motivation to do something isn't to say that there has to be an specific incident causing that motivation shown on screen.

Cap is a good example of how we don't need a tragic incident to show how a character's moral code was formed. He wants to join the army because everyone else is putting their lives at risk and he feels he can't do any less. We don't need a scene of his mom being killed by Nazis or something. He's more or less just established to be that guy and his origin is that Erskine see's what's already in him and selects him for the Super Soldier program. When he crashes the Red Skulls plane near the end of the first movie I'm not thinking "Man, that guy really must have hated bullies to have sacrificed himself like that".

If you really need Spidey's motivation spelled out that badly, he literally states it out loud in his first MCU appearance in Civil War "When you can do the things that I can, but you don't, and then the bad things happen, they happen because of you.". Would it have helped somehow if they had just found a way to loop that line into Homecoming somehow even though everybody commenting in this thread I'm sure saw Civil War? Maybe the argument is that Civil War is a different movie and we're trying to judge HC in a vacuum for academic reasons, or that since this is the first solo movie it needs to clearly restate his motivation under the "every comic is somebody's first" rules".

Beyond that, I guess I just don't get the notion that comic book characters specifically need their unique motivations pointed out in order for their movies to be good. It's essentially just arguing that ever character needs an origin story movie, but without anybody actually coming out and arguing that. To me this conversation is like if somebody told me Ghostbusters is a bad movie because we don't get any backstory on any of the characters to explain why they risk their lives against Gozer at the end. They do it because it needs to be done, it's the right thing to do, and they're the only ones capable.

There are certain things that are integral to a character.  If you leave them out of the character's story, you're missing key elements of that character.  Ben and the phrase "With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility" are key elements of Peter Parker as Spider-man.  Without them, you can have a hero, but he isn't "THE" Peter Parker Spider-man.  He is more of a "What If?" character.

If you fuck with this shit, you end up with Smallville.  You might enjoy the entertainment, but Smallville wasn't a Superman show.

We didn't get these key Spider-man elements here and that left me wondering why this Peter was web slinging.  Why was he out there being a hero?  It sure as hell looked like he thought being an Avenger was important because it was cool.  He wanted to be a cool Avenger.  He wanted to "do more" because it excited him.  He got a taste of the big leagues and wanted to get back into it.  

From Civil War, we know that the action starts about six months after Ben's death.  If you're a 15 year old kid and you fuck up and it results in your surrogate father dying, that emotional turmoil is not tied up in 6 months.  The comic book Spider-man wrestles with it still - years/decades/whatever later.  You don't watch Stark hit on May and not feel angry.  You don't have friends comment on your hot Aunt and laugh it off.  Hell, you probably can't even look her in the eyes, especially if she doesn't know you blame yourself.  This is a Peter that doesn't think about being there for May when deciding to go away for an overnight trip.   This is not a Peter that has that weight - and without that weight, this Peter is not the true Spider-man character. 

I applaud them not taking 20 minutes to go through the story again.  We didn't need the full length of it.  I just lament that they don't give us the quick version of the bite, of Ben's death, and of Peter feeling that responsibility. 

So, if Ben isn't mentioned and his catchphrase isn't spoken during the ~90 minutes of Spider-Man's life we see, it's as if Ben never existed at all?

If a Spider-Man movie isn't a tedious emotional drain at some point, it isn't a Spider-Man movie at all?

I haven't really weighed in on this because I haven't seen the movie yet, but actually, yes, it's not really a Spider-Man movie without that tedious emotional drain. That emotional drain is what I always disliked about the character but I do feel it is fundamental to the character himself. I'm not going to be broken up that it's not in there because again, I always HATED how whiny the character was. One of the things I like about the latest post-Secret Wars comic Spider-Man/Peter Parker is that that baggage is much more subtle and his character isn't just the perpetual teen angst superhero that they tried to keep him at for years. He's a more mature Parker as Tony Stark with a heart. It sounds like the movie wanted to have all the positives of the current version of the character like the gadget Spider suit but ditch the emotional baggage that defines the character.

Yeah, that's my complaint. It's fine to ditch the baggage. Great to even move on and show how he's dealt with it, but you do that with an older character.

When you state, explicitly, that the accident that turned Peter into Spider-Man happened ONLY 6 months ago, and neither he nor his aunt have any real fucks to give about Ben, you've either decided to ditch that part entirely or you've written a shitty characterization.

Adult Peter will have acknowledged and moved-on. Even a few-years-in Peter might have started to come to grips with and realized he's done more net good than his big mistake, but will still obsess of making sure May isn't hurt. 6-months-in Peter giving no fucks? Yeah, no.

When did they mention the accident was 6 months ago?  I missed it.  The movie makes it feel like he has been Spider-Man for a while, more like a year or two than 6 months.

So I liked this movie.

I am not torn about them not doing another jumping cut rendition of Uncle Ben dying and Peter Parker hearing his surrogate father saying "with great power comes with great responsibility". However. UNCLE BEN IS SPIDER MAN. Fucks sake people. Captain American always wanted to be a soldier during a time when being a soldier meant punching Hitler in the face and getting revenge for Pearl Harbor. Of course he doesn't need a tragic back story, he is the greatest generation summed up in red white and blue spandex minus none of the other things we attribute to white men in the 40s. But that's not spiderman fuck me, thats not peter parker.

Neither is he tony stark little because that's boring and comic books are bad. Spiderman is working class blue collar hero, the type of guy with a phd but would work in a public high school because helping everyone kids is more important than moving along the 20 kids who can afford his intelligence. Yes having uncle ben psychologically scaring the kids for life is a big part of that character. So at some point, uncle ben may need to show up.

As far as spideman. Again liked the movie (alot) but the following nitpicks needs to be said

1. Spiderman not really. They really emphasized boy aspects of his character. So much so I spent a good bit of the movie not taking him too seriously. And that was almost fine and they actually did show some of the "true grit" aspect of his character in the later half. Sam Remi's spiderman (not spiderman 3) did a better job of emphasizing a lot of the pain and shear struggle associated with spiderman's heroics.

2. Supporting cast has issues. I wanted to punch the fat kid in the face. Repeatedly. So much so that everything that came from his mouth almost triggered a violent outburst. Spiderman is not a CW character, he doesn't need a mother fucking guy in a god damn chair. But even going beyond that the only good supporting cast was Liz who while realistically would never talk to peter parker sold the "mary j" vibe this movie really missed. BUT FOR FUCK SAKE why they completely throw MJ actual character out the window. Man the holy hell why not call her gwen stacy fuck sake you basically wrote her...... fuck me just make new characters pretend all the ones we actually know got hit by a bus.

Dude, I think you missed a lot of subtext.  Like, a LOT.   
Ned was BRILLIANT.  I loved him.  Peter actually DID need a guy in the chair.  While some might see this as a departure, guy owned the role and the chemistry between them both rocked.  Liz was also a character out of place, which you understand when you
Also, it's clear they didn't want to touch Gwen Stacey with a fucking bargepole after Emma Stone and I don't blame them.  ASM was all over the shop with her and it's best forgotten for now.

Seriously, with that Sig, I can never tell if you're trolling or just daft.  It's a worry. 

Somewhat tangental to the whole "Uncle Ben" thing:  Perhaps the Age difference with his aunt plays a much more significant role in this iteration of the spiderman universe than we are fully appreciating.   jgsugden mentions that Peter has no problem going off on a school trip and leaving May behind.  But why should he?  This isnt 60+ year old May who could be his grandmother, who just lost the "man" of the household and needs Peter to stand in to fill that role.  She is young enough that Stark is hitting on her, that the local sandwich shop guy comments on how hot she is.  We don't know what she does for a living, but it can be safely assumed that she is probably still working a 9 to 5 job, and even without her husband (assuming he even exists), she is the one who appears more likely to be taking care of Peter than needing Peter to take care of her.   That alone changes the dynamic of an entire facet of Peter's character.

In all honesty, without actually knowing how they plan to deal with the "Ben" section of the current Peter's story, we won't really know what angle they are going for.

PS: I watched that clip from Civil war.  He mentions he has had his powers for 6 months.  He mentions "Bad things happening, and if you have the power to do something about it and don't, then they happen because of you", but Ben is never actually mentioned at all.   They essentially managed to allude to the standard Ben Dying / Peter blaming himself origin beat and simultaneously paraphrase "With great power comes great responsibility" without actually touching directly on either. So at this point, all we really know is there may be some kind of "bad thing" that happened that Peter may think he could have prevented, but since Uncle Ben has never actually been mentioned, literally ever, we have no idea if he even exists in this iteration of Spiderman.

Its not that I don't get the subtext. Its just that I don't like it. At all. Because it sucks. Not ruin the movie suck. But coming from someone who followed spider-man in the animated series, read some comics, cried bitter tears when spectacular spider-man was canceled. I don't care what the characters look like as long as the characterization is about right and since spiderman is my sacred cow, I actually like the dynamics in the media I mentioned before. Granted this is waaaaaaaaay better than Rami's or Garfields supporting caste. But if you write gwen stacey, have a character act like gwen stacey, but call her MARY JANE? FUCKING CALL HER GWEN STACEY. Flash thompson also sucked for the same reason. Call him Harry Osborn, just do it please thank you bye.

Also fat kid repeatedly attempting to blow spidermans secret identity for the stupidest reasons? Come on. If your going to give spiderman a cisco ramon for the love of christ don't have the cisco be that stupid.

Ned wasn't stupid; he was just an average teenager.  Having just gone through a daughter as a teen and now having a son as one, Ned was as smart as 90% of teens I've encountered through their friends. Yes, that's terrifying, but it's accurate. (Yes it applied to us at that age as well.)

Fuck, if anything boys get dumber than Ned when they hit their early 20's. The shit I just dealt with regarding a house of 20-something boys is proof of that to me.

If I want to punch the kid in his face every time he talks must be a sign of my advancing age.

It has little to do with age. It has everything to do with the guilt of being responsible for her soulmates death... and her not knowing that he actually does deserve some of the blame. Peter destroyed her life and ended Ben's. And he is 15. That fucks a kid up more than 6 months can fix, especially when he had no way to share it.  He doesn't have to be emo Parker, but he has to feel that weight to be the Peter Parker we've seen for 50 years. You can't make Cap a Gulf War vet without changing his DNA.  You can't make Stark a poor repairman without changing his DNA. You can't make Parker without the Ben trauma without changing the fundamental DNA of Spider-man.

Further to add here: Tomei is talking about a script scene that was never shot in which May saves a kid, Peter sees it, May doesn't know he sees it, May doesn't tell Peter because it would worry him, and this inspires Peter to take his approach to being a hero.

aunt may the retired super model is not something im going to get used to anytime this decade.

Ned is basically Peter Parker's best friend from the Ultimate Spider-Man book, a kid named Ganke Lee. I have no idea how consciously they were basing him on Ganke, but that's fundamentally who he is. And he's fine. Peter actually needs a good friend like that to anchor him into a high school reality--in the early Lee/Ditko books, he really doesn't have a good friend at first, which is why he is first so selfish about getting spider powers, because he's a nerd who gets beaten up by everyone. I think it's time to evolve that plotline at least, and they did a good job with it here.

You can, however, do that for Punisher.  Because all that matters is his fucking family get wasted.   :why_so_serious:

This is the movie you guys need.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Za77OuZ2Irs

I know you're being a bit tongue in asscheek here, but: Yes, you can.  Korea, Vietnam and Gulf War can be interchanged in the Punisher origin (or Stark origin) in comics/MCU.  The  wars provide similar (enough) social elements and commentary to inform who the character is.  All three were 'reluctant wars' where the US was torn on the extent of US involvement and the reasons for the war.  As a society, we cared about the story of how much these wars damaged the soldiers in them.  

The American War for Independence, the Civil War, WW I, WW II and Vietnam all are really different, however.  The people fighting them were different, had different beliefs, and were impacted differently by the experience.  The war is a supporting character in their story.

A Captain America made out of the Gulf War might be a moral, standup, virtuous leader.  However, what he'd symbolize as the Hero of the Effort would be different.  His war was not widely seen as a virtuous war by the people of the time.  He was hunting a villain in SH, but SH wasn't Hitler.  Iraq is a postage stamp compared to the Axis.  The fate of American business interests and a few hundred thousand people were on the line in Iraq and Kuwait, at most.  WWII was a war for the fate of our World.  If Cap as we know him were introduced in the Gulf War, the people behind him would see him differently, and his legacy would be different.

Punisher went through hell in a war that is known to have damaged people.  Then his family was murdered and the war he brought back with him was turned on bad guys.  That is the Punisher.  Give that story to a WWII vet and you get a different story.  As we move further in time and revisionist efforts re-characterize how we see these wars through modern lenses, things change - but if you tell that story in the 1950s, Punisher is not an anti-hero... he is a 100% villain.  

On another note: I've seen comments that the Ned in the show is an amalgam of Ganke Lee (who is more of a Miles Morales character) and Ned Leeds - the kid that grows up and marries Betty Brant (the school reporter) and later becomes a Hobgoblin.  I'm betting we get Osborne as a college friend and that story plays out in the college years films, but Ned may also eventually get crazy and ride the glider.

Put down the fucking pipe.  Jesus H Christ.

This movie was awesome and I've been a spiderman fan since the 90's so I understand the 'issues' people will have with the changes but man....

Look, when people start picking this movie apart all I can say is "Remember when Peter erased his marriage with Mary Jane to bring his dead octogenarian aunt back from the dead by making a deal with the devil?"

Yeah, comic core tenants and continuity can go fuck themselves, this movie was a good take on spiderman.

I think spiderman fans have a right to nitpick because part of being a fan is enjoying what makes spiderman spiderman (especially the elements that remain consistent across adaptations of the character we actually like). HOWEVER I can nitpick and still say they made a badass film. But comics are stupid. No one will try to defend brand new day or the clone saga.

TIL bad storylines are the same as core character concepts.

Home made web shooters were a core concept of scientist peter was a core concept until they become available organic and then back? What people consider core concepts can and have changed throughtout with very little exception.

I need to go watch this but my take on the change is that I don't think it's enough to make the film bad or anything but it sounds like a 'streamlining' of the character. They didn't want to spend time in the film on that kind of motivational aspect and so they just cut it and left his motivation to be a hero as a gimme. I don't think that necessarily hurts this movie but it does weaken the character and removes some depth. That does change the character, it reduces story telling possibilities and I don't like it much but I can also recognise that if they're aiming to tell stories focused on Peter's relationship with Tony or his aunt matched with the normal super hero crap, that will make perfectly good movies for the MCU.

Where it risks changing the character instead of just simplifying is if they look for some in-universe replacement for that motivation. If they have Peter putting in that extra effort or taking on that unwinnable challenge to impress Stark, that's a different character to one who has taken on an ultimate sense of responsibility. I guess it could open up the door for storylines with the other MCU big brands but it's going to result in Spiderman, eventually, doing things that won't make sense for Spiderman to do.

It is by no means a bad movie.  It's a very good movie.  It's the best Spider Man we've had yet.  There are multiple wondrous things about it.

I can't stress that enough.

They do allude to uncle ben having ben murdered and it's definitely something that peter seems to anguish over.  I think people forget when tony found peter that he was already spiderman and trying to be a hero. Just because they dont mention ben or peters motivations doesnt mean they scrapped that backstory, it just wasnt in this movie.

Actually, as I mentioned a few posts earlier up, they have quite literally NEVER mentioned Ben in the MCU iteration of Spiderman.  They have hinted at a "bad thing" that may have happened that parker possibly feels responsible for failing to prevent, but uncle ben quite literally does not exist at this point from everything we can see.  All cases of Ben in the MCU are us subconsciously inserting him into the story because we have been conditioned to do so, because we just know that he belongs in that part of peter's origin story.

They also never once mention peters parents, kraven, harry osborne,j jonah kameson or otto octaviis and i for one and upset all these iconic characters are not in the mcu

You know for years people have said they should stop showing batmans parents dying and this is exactly what they are afraid of.  The minute a movie doesn't explicitly state something people lose their shit.

No.  Sorry, but No.

No-one here has said that they want to see an Old Man snuff it again.  In fact, most have specifically said to stop it.

But don't pretend it didn't happen because you didn't show it.  His absence is weird and felt.  It would be like if they DIDN'T mention he was bitten by a Spider.  Which they did.  And then made a hilarious scene out of it.  And yet when people are freaking out and people are talking about Aunt's freaking out and so on and so forth, it fucking echoes with the absence.

As I mentioned, it literally felt like Lawyers had stopped them mentioning it, so noticeable was the absence.

I agree the omission was almost certainly intentional but I don't think maliciously so, this was simply not that story.   I will say there was one scene in particular when peter was arguing with tony on the bridge after the boat where I thought it would be perfect to bring up ben but I really just think the director wanted to leave that for later, perhaps even a very emotional back/forth with aunt may that might have made this movie run too long.   We know the plan was for her to find out about Peter and there's a lot of good writing that is gonna come out in that conflict.

However...I never felt the omission affected the movie in that, everything peter did he did with a sense of responsibility.  Ignoring the first party, saying no to the pool party and even his own dream homecoming dance there were plenty of moments where the influence of peter's past affects his current self.  To say it didn't happen cause we didn't talk about it is kind of weird, they don't talk about uncle ben in every single spiderman comic either.

I didn't think Bens absence was neither weird nor felt.

Maybe we could have a Spiderman where Ben is a ghost that offers him advice. With like, a bluish tint. We'd call him Old Ben.

Like so?

(http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Qkfqtrlh-DQ/UlrQCuJK6vI/AAAAAAAASXM/0KvteMgpIFA/s1600/asm33-1.jpg)

Michael Keaton stole the show...And really the movie is worth seeing for him alone.