The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is not an easy movie to form an opinion on. The film gets so much right with its spectacular special effects, superb action sequences, great score, and interesting characters that are portrayed with great chemistry between the actors. It was able to hold my attention throughout, and was surprisingly emotionally affecting during its ultimate climax. It is all the more unfortunate then, that The Amazing Spider-Man 2 gets so much wrong; embarrassing itself with its nonsensical plot and falling into the all too familiar trap of many of its superhero movie predecessors; too many villains.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 is a visual treat and looks fantastic in motion. I saw it in 3D, this amplified the over-the-top special effects and put me right into the middle of the action. Electro’s Computer-Generated Imagery (CGI) electrical powers were especially impressive, and it is fascinating to watch just how powerful he gets over the course of the story. The best aspect of the film, by far, is watching Spider Man duke it out with the villains that terrorize the citizens of New York. And the score, composed by Hans Zimmer and the Magnificent Six, is excellent and moves the action along nicely while also contributing to the excitement of the fight scenes. The fights between Electro and Spider Man were among my favorite scenes in the entire film, watching them dart between the skyscrapers of New York City was a thing of beauty. The characters of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 are also a stylistic high point, Dane Dehaan as Harry Osborn and Andrew Garfield as Peter Parker stood out particularly in my mind. The actors have great onscreen chemistry and the dialogue is at turns wittily campy and deeply emotional; I never felt like the actor’s lines were at odds with the character’s personalities, and that speaks volumes to the convincing way in which the lines were delivered. Yes, the characters tended to be fairly one-dimensional, particularly Electro, but it really didn’t matter as I genuinely enjoyed watching them interact on screen.
Unfortunately for The Amazing Spider-Man 2, the film never really plays to its strengths because the storytelling is a tangled mess throughout the duration of the film. Plotlines come out of nowhere and are just as quickly abandoned; an entire subplot about Aunt May struggling to work two jobs is introduced in the middle of the film, yet is never mentioned again which seems at odds with the original scene’s implied importance. Sudden tonal shifts and strange filmmaking decisions, such Kid Cudi songs playing in the background while Peter Parker experiments with batteries, hamper the film and dampen some of the emotional impact the director is striving for. At some points, the excellent acting and action were the only things that held my interest. Curiously, The Amazing Spider Man 2 undermines itself by relegating interesting villains, such as Green Goblin and the Rhino, to brief scenes towards the end of the film after it has reached its emotional climax. The use of too many villains seems to be a recurring problem with some superhero films, and ironically, was one of the larger issues that hamstrung Spider-Man 3. The villains of The Amazing Spider Man-2 were all interesting and well-acted enough to have been the focus of their own movie, and it was disappointing that they were not fleshed out enough. The Green Goblin, which is one of Spider Man’s most famous villains, was particularly disappointing in this regard; he was introduced and promptly removed in the space of about 25 minutes. I felt as though The Amazing Spider-Man 2 could have excluded some of it’s less consequential plotlines and scenes in order to create more screen time for the various villains.
I enjoyed The Amazing Spider-Man 2. The action set pieces were spectacular, and the acting combined with the sharp dialogue between the characters was top notch. It’s a shame, however, that those successes were somewhat negated by the overcomplicated story riddled with unresolved subplots. Had the writers and producers trimmed some of the storytelling fat and allowed for more screen time for the movies excellent villains, I probably would have enjoyed The Amazing Spider-Man 2 a lot more. As it stands, however, the film is largely inconsistent and can only be described as “OK”; marked by some triumphant highs, and some very dismal lows. If you’re a fan of Spider-Man, or just superhero films in general, you’ll probably find something to like. That being said, I can’t give a ringing endorsement of the movie because of its multiple, and at times inexcusable, failings. I give The Amazing Spider-Man 2 a 6/10.