If you want to take an untainted look before I start going all negative, hit the picture link right below for the HD copy at Yahoo….
It’s pretty easy and reductive to call any action movie with low-key photography and some darkness to it “Nolanized” but I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch in this case. All rain, and grim drama, and stylized technology, this trailer indicates that for all of Marc Webb’s talk that the mechanical web shooters and other changes they’ve made are signs they’re “going back to the comics,” this couldn’t be farther from a classic comic book. Raimi kept it comic book, if nothing else.
I don’t think it’s fair to say this is the Spider-Man-(twi)light version we all feared when it was first announced, but they seemed to have shifted to the dour Batman tone for the dramatic threads. I mean, I guess the sequence that ends the trailer is lit by sunlight, but the rest of the trailer reads as pretty darkly toned. And while it’s too early to call this one way or another, I can’t hide the fact that I’m already bored with this origin story told again with new fancy production design. The casting is still good, but they’re really going to have to inject this with something new to make it worthwhile, and a gimmicky, obviously CGI first-person approach isn’t going to cut it.
Thinking to interviews in which Marc Webb has claimed they’re approach to Spidey’s powers are more real-world and grounded, I can’t help but chuckle. Yes, this jerky CGI composite of an unnaturally long shot is much more real than swinging an actual camera between buildings from a helicopter.
Recently Sebastian put together a very nice rundown of exactly why throwing Raimi’s films under the bus (as much as I hate 3) is a load of horseshit. Make sure you’ve checked it out.
But what do you guys think? I’m off the negative nancy deep-end right off, but did you find stuff to like? Let me know on Twitter, in the comments, or on the boards!
24 comments
I wasn’t writing this reboot off out of hand.
At least, until I saw this trailer. I don’t mean to throw out a bunch of hyperbole, but I can’t think of a trailer in recent memory that immediately turned me so far off of a film as this one. Not even the first Green Lantern trailer. This looks like it’s taking itself WAY too seriously, and dreadfully boring, to boot. Spider-Man may have a hard life, but he’s still supposed to be fun, dammit. This doesn’t look fun. At all.
Well. I’m not too excited about it. I like the cast, though.
Renn Brown, I thought the…Amazing Spider-Man Trailer was…Better than the one for Dark Knight Rises. However both trailers are fairly…underwhelming!
Funny because I think I already like this more than Raimi’s.
I’m unmoved either way. There’s a tendency to over-analyze these promo pieces when they come out, but even at the base level of advertisement, it is supposed to catch the viewer’s interest and sell them on the product. I feel nothing but neutral so far.
Totally agree with your points, Renn.
I’m just very “meh” on this after watching it several times. I buy Garfield, I do, but it’s such a tired origin story by now. Does anyone REALLY not know what that story actually is by now? And call me crazy, but when was Spider-Man THIS heavy-handed? There should be serious moments, no doubt, but Raimi really nailed the fun of it all, and that came first, I thought.
Basing every opinion off of one trailer is always short-sighted but in this case pretty justified, I’d imagine.
Im kinda done caring about his origin story too. Even without the first Raimi movie its been done to death in the cartoons and comics. Their cant be many people that would consider seeing a comic book movie who dont already know how he got his powers.
Also, really hoping that first person stuff was just for the trailer and not in the actual movie because it didnt even manage to look as good as in-game footage from Mirror’s Edge(which looked great for a video game but surely wouldnt make the cut on the big screen as a finished product).
I understand the desire on the part of the filmmakers to do the origin story again; they are telling their own story and they want to start at the beginning. However, as most everyone seems to think, it has been done to death. They should keep the origin story, but nest it in flashbacks as in Burton’s first Batman or Punisher: War Zone, but I’m partial to this approach. I think the Incredible Hulk should have done this too instead of having a ‘last week on Hulk’ opening sequence.
Spider-Man 4: The Dawson’s Creek Years.
There were ways to do this that didn’t involve a scorched earth, back to the drawing board retelling of the origin story. Garfield and Stone look college aged and there is nothing in this trailer that suggests high school. A soft reboot, set in college, dealing with Peter’s missing parents and giving the origin in brief flashbacks would have worked just fine.
I don’t think there was ever any real risk of this being very twilight-esque. I’d also reserve judgment on it being a Batman Begins ripoff, because the marketing department and the creative team are two very different beasts. Going grim in the trailer might just be marketing latching onto the dark Batman/Harry Potter mania at the moment, and very well might not reflect the actual tone of the movie.
However, I (reluctantly, because I love the character and want it to be a good movie) have to admit another origin story, not just for Spidey, but for all comic characters, does not interest me. We, the audience, have accepted that superheroes exist in film, we don’t need to know the hows or whys.
If they throw a lot of budget at the First Person POV stuff, that could actually be amazing in theaters. Big if.
That Spidey POV sequence was laughable bad. The dark serious tone doesn’t suit Spider-Man at all. I’m no big fan of Raimi’s films, but at least he kept it glossy and fun. This looks as much fun as wisdom teeth extraction.
That was dumb.
Can we pretend Spiderman 3 never happened and let Raimi pick up again from where 2 left off and Harry can chuck Dunst off a fucking bridge? That would have been amazing.
Nice and angsty. Fucking stupid. And it’s nice to see an almost 30 year old Spidey back in high school.
regardless of anything else I want to see the POV bit in 3D. That’s about as close to being Spidey that I’m ever going to get. And yes it was a dour trailer but it was just a trailer.
Totally agree with the Mirror’s Edge comparison, but i kind of liked the first person POV shot. A little weird a first, but I think it has some promise if it is used to a greater extent in the movie. Not the greatest trailer ever, but it has potential.
if they wanted to get all “tortured” and “angsty” like batman, they should have hired David Cronenberg as director….
Looks great to me. Much better than Raimi’s soap-operatic urban fairytale and his mute and lumpy Spiderman. Seems like a well crafted and grounded story with some great actors. I hope it doesn’t go too serious, but that fantastic first person swinging seems to have all the colourful joy of being Spidey. We might even get a real Green Goblin at one point if this goes well. I really do not get the pessimism after the abortion of the last film, and the not very close to the source previous ones.
I think you guys are focusing on the wrong thing. The origin story is necessary as its changing from the Raimi versions entirely. Its changing love interests with Gwen Stacy, changing Villains with The Lizard. Mechanical web shooters. Its going into a different telling of Spiderman entirely. If they can class up the first person stuff and sharpen it, I’m downright excited for this version…. if they keep the teen angst in check, of course.
Every time I read one of your posts it plays in my head like fucking Shatner… Drives me nuts. Ellipses!
I was going to mention Mirror’s Edge as well. Does not work for this. They should have gotten a guy to do some awesome parkour shit with a helmet cam on some “rooftops” in a studio over a green screen.
I don’t think it’s entirely a bad thing that this version of the mythos aims to be a bit more serious. Remember, all of the complaints being lobbed at this teaser could have easily been used when someone decided it would be a good idea to “grim-dark” Batman up.
In retrospect I do not think Raimi‘s take on the origin was THAT bad.
It had some funny moments to it (Parker being surprised by his own muscular body
and how he is able to avoid the punch).
I also think that the first time we REALLY see Parker move as Spider-Man ( http://tinyurl.com/43vs6yg ) is the coolest scene in Raimi‘s entire trilogy.
But this could work out…
If I still might find the energy to sit through all this crap with spider bite, wrestling scene
and Ben‘s death AGAIN.
What I don‘t.
So let me know if it was any good, because when this comes out, I am staying home!
Yeah, I’m not sure that I have the willingness to stave off boredom by sitting through Spidey’s origin story again.
This also looks like a pretty blatant ‘Spider-Man Begins’ Nolan-rip-off.
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