Superhero Franchises & Where Sony Went Wrong With ‘Amazing Spider-Man’
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NaboCaneNew MemberOPThe most intelligent exploration of the differences among the approaches and corresponding results by the 'Avengers'/'Iron Man,' 'X-Men,' and 'Spider-Man' franchisees.
At Marvel, events of “Iron Man 2” set up revelations in “The Avengers," which were eventually discussed in “Captain America: The Winter Solder," and so on. The difference was that Marvel could space this out over a few years and take the time to develop movies and stories that appealed to fans. Sony seemed ready to shove everything into “The Amazing Spider-Man,” to the point where whispers all over the internet spoke of fully-developed deleted sequences based on unaccounted-for footage in the promotional material.
Sony needs to give “Spider-Man” a break. Do the minimum required to keep the rights from Marvel, but sit on it. Spider-Man fights crime in New York, so have “Sinister Six” (presumably starring Dane DeHaan, Felicity Jones and Paul Giamatti) and “Venom” (with a familiar leading man of choice) take place somewhere else. Craft stories around these characters so that by the time they do face Spider-Man, the conflict is relatable, understandable. Spidey has starred in five movies over the course of twelve years. Comparatively, the “X-Men” have been featured in seven films over fourteen years, but characters like Wolverine have been seen in previous decades, new genres, Westchester to Japan to Washington D.C. Fox has kept that property fresh by diversifying. Sony needs to take these steps, to make something that costs less and makes less like “X-Men: First Class,” which sidelined the wildly popular Wolverine. Only then will people want to see the wall-crawler again.
The article is plagued by one damning omission, however, and that's a discussion and appraisal of the actors chosen to portray arguably the most beloved and most iconic superhero in comicdom, and how those choices alienated older, more-affluent fans.
Alex44New MemberI agree but FWIW I though Amazing Spider Man was every bit as good as say...Iron Man 2 or any of the X-Men/Wolverine movies.
Now the Toby Spider Man movies were just crap.
On the draft Quentin Rollins bandwagon.
schmoliootsubscriber"Alex44 wrote:
I agree but FWIW I though Amazing Spider Man was every bit as good as say...Iron Man 2 or any of the X-Men/Wolverine movies.
Now the Toby Spider Man movies were just crap.
Really?
I cannot imagine there are many comic book movie fans who would agree with this.
The Raimi Spider Man films were far better than either ASM. I recently went back and watched Spider Man 3 which I thought sucked at the time and it was better than ASM.
The only decent thing in ASM is the chemistry between Garfield and Emma Stone (who probably could've had chemistry with anybody), and now that's gone.
What Sony's done with Spider Man is an absolute abomination and a slap in the face to anybody that cared about the character, from monkeying with the origin for no reason, to that incredibly lame, borderline insulting change regarding Peter's responsibility for Ben's death, both films have been a disaster.
Seriously, every time I see Peter let a criminal escape OVER A BOTTLE OF CHOCOLATE MILK I want to smash the tv.
Paganforum_veteran"Alex44 wrote:
Now the Toby Spider Man movies were just crap.
Disagree strongly. Toby was closer to the original idea of Parker than Garfield was.
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Galantforum_veteranThe idea that the Spider-man franchise should somehow look up to the X-Men franchise is utterly laughable.
For me that basically says, "Take Spider-man, gut the plot, switch the uniform, make key characters different ages to ruin any potential relationships, pour even more characters in so none of them get developed properly, and then persistently make the franchise worse and worse with constant adjustments and 'twists' - it doesn't matter because people don't know the source material. It's all about the FX!".
Admittedly, I haven't seen Days of Future Past yet, which everyone I've spoken to says is the saviour of the franchise, however, as someone who mis-spent far too much of his youth on X-Men, I completely soured on the series. The Wolverine was maybe the best of the bunch but that's not saying much after so many failures. The whole heart of X-Men, and most of the characters, was absent from the movies.
The Spider-Man series have had their faults but their far closer to the source material, far classier, far better produced, far more entertaining and, simply, just better movies all round. Even the third Raimi flick.
The one single lesson that studios need to learn from the Avengers series is that it's okay to slow down, take your time, and introduce and develop more minor characters. Just have a good vision and tell a good story and don't worry about sprinkling on the star dust to make the movies shiny.
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rafaelforum_veteranIMO Garfield does a decent job of embodying the Spider-man of my youth. That Spidey was basically a teenager (not just in age, but in personality). As a teenager myself, I liked that character. I related to him and Spidey was by far my favorite superhero growing up. But, I've changed. I don't relate to that teenage personality anymore. I am now more likely to be annoyed by that same personality. Unfortunately for the movie series, more of the movie going public is probably similar to me.
I do agree that the primary lesson from the avengers is to slow down and introduce and develop the minor characters. I think you see the same thing in GoT. When you have a vast universe of diverse characters it not only makes it more interesting, but also increases the odds that a larger number of viewers will find a character that they relate to and care about.
maynardNew MemberPeter Parker is the problem with Spider Man :up:
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