Review of The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014) by Xaiver1 — 10 May 2014

Amazingly Bad. For such a great Marvel character and how good the Spidey "reboot" started out in ASM1 - This movie fails at almost every turn.

It wants to build up the "Stacy/Parker" relationship, but all we get are an overload of half a dozen or so scenes that go nowhere. Emma Stone and Andrew Garfield both seems to be desperately searching to be anywhere else other than this movie their dialogue in these scenes seems forced and uncomfortable and only adds to the clunky pacing of the film.

Jamie Foxx a talented Actor and Comedian appears as Electro the more or less central villain of the film. Foxx is totally wasted here as he is given almost nothing to say and even less to do but act as a focal point for Michael Bay-level Special Effects. Ditto for Paul Giamatti.

The motivations behind why many of these villains become villains are so oddly concocted that they are beyond ridiculous and in some cases missing altogether, this is also true for many scenes in the movie itself even in an a truly awkward moment near the end of the movie that seems intent to create a somber and heartfelt moment, but is more so just a desperate gimmick. There are scenes that go on and on and on well past their expiration date and others that seem inserted from the movie that this one was supposed to be. I read somewhere that several different writers worked on the script for this movie– They all must have really disliked each other.

I get it these are all supposed to be comic book characters, but that is exactly what has made many of the movies in the Marvel Universe (i.e.,Avengers, Captain America, etc.) so good; the filmmakers made an effort to try and portray the characters as somewhat realistic people. This movie is so bad that even the Marvel trademark ‘Easter Egg’ is botched as a hastily added afterthought.