The newest big-screen Spider-Man venture is one of already mixed emotions. Sending some fan boy rages tingling and spinning for others a new friendly neighborhood outlook, it really could swing both ways. Whether it’s shooting premature webs or the time really is ripe to move past Raimi, the reboot bomb has been dropped nonetheless. Yet as with any beloved franchise (well…aside from that third one) being re-imagined…people have grown illogically defensive of the prior Toby McGuire flicks and proclaim that the Marc Webb directed relaunch is riddled with inaccuracies and ignored source material. So I’m here to exterminate the cobweb misconceptions that are jumping around 2012’s summer blockbuster revamp, The Amazing Spider-Man.
Gwen Stacy: Most are familiar with the ravaging redhead that shares her moniker with stoner bane, but it’s simply not true to state that Mary Jane is the one and only love of the wall crawler. Blond bombshell Gwendolyn Stacy first appeared in The Amazing Spider-Man #31, some eleven issues before Ms. MJ Watson ends a long-running gag of close encounters to meet our hero face-to-face. Peter passionately dated Gwen years before he and Mary Jane ever truly got together. Though having a flirtatious roller-coaster ride friendship since their first day, Peter only lit the official joint after Gwen’s 
untimely death at the hands of the Green Goblin. In fact, neither is his first factual girlfriend. That trophy belongs to the now mostly forgotten Daily Bugle secretary, Betty Brant. Face it, Tiger…MJ just wasn’t his first.
The Lizard: Dr. Curt Connors is the one-armed scientist confidant and occasional villain of the amazing Spider-Man. The Jekyll and Hyde-esque foe evolved out of Dr. Connors attempt to re-grow lost and amputated limbs (like that of his own) via the regenerating genes of certain reptile physiology. It’s a science-fiction concept staggeringly not all that fictitious (HERE). Let’s just hope there are no giant mutant starfish-people running around their makeshift Bikini Bottom by 2020. Hey, Marvel says it could happen.
So why Lizard? Connors offers an emotional dynamic not present in many of Spidey’s rogues gallery, Peter’s one-time friend now corrupted into a deeply personal confrontation where he feels obligated to pull punches. He’s one of the more noteworthy enemies, yet his depiction in the film has met some negativity, largely in part to him not having a snout. The truth is that the more Todd McFarlane bestial dinosaur-man interpretation may be the most familiar, but for decades he was far less velociraptor and far more a man with a tail and a horrible case of shingles – much more like how he’s seen on film. With the apparent rumors that Raimi’s next villain was slated to be Vulture, typically portrayed as a flying elderly man in feathered green tights, I think we’ve moved up in the world.
High School: For some bizarre reason it became a hip bandwagon shot to claim that The Amazing Spider-Man is going to Twilight our protagonist by putting him in High School. What I don’t understand is…did people take a catnap during the first hour of 2002’s Spider-Man? The first twenty-eight issues 
have Peter dodging the bullying Flash Thompson and attempting to woo Liz Allen in very Archie-like High School charades…complete with zero sparkling fairy vampires. Not until Amazing Spider-Man #31 did he move onto Empire State University and associate with the likes of Harry Osborn. So this concern that things will end up remarkably like WB teenybopper television is a silly perversion of what ultimately is true to the source material.
Parents: The lineage of the Parker family has often been something swept under the rug, never all that relevant to the immediate and yet curiously intriguing nonetheless. Just why were Peter’s grandparent-age Aunt and Uncle his surrogate parents? I can’t be the only one who wondered about the family dynamic. Your nephew having two daddies is less convoluted.
In Amazing Spider-Man Annual #5, we got the answer that made McCarthyism fears come alive. Inside a basement trunk, Peter discovers news clipping and photographs of his parents slandered as American traitors. Holidaying in Algeria to discover the truth of the matter, it’s later revealed that they were as red, white, and blue as Captain America. Mary and Richard Parker were actually secret double-agents (later loosely connected to S.H.I.E.L.D.) for the good old US, fighting the good fight against the likes of non-other than the Red Skull and his Nazi party. As a result, their airplane was sabotaged and thus began the first of many infamous tragedies in the life of Spider-Man.
Web-Shooters: In the original film series, Spidey’s greatest tool was omitted to perhaps simplify the over-all themes and morals. If he’s born with precognitive spider-sense and the proportionate strength of an arachnid (among other things), why couldn’t he just biologically shoot webs from his wrist? It’s all relative. A fair assessment and one that eventually modern comics would adapt to by also throwing the iconic web-shooters to the wayside in favor of organics. Today (because of the exposure of the films) it’s staggering how many modern fans aren’t aware of his self-created synthetic web-fluid. Adding a level of serious suspense to battle and accuracy to the established continuity, they’re a welcome addition to the films and one I personally hope will…ah…stick around.
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Indeed, it’s sad how many people nerd rage over this movie when it seems to be the most accurate Spidey movie yet. Maybe we’ll get a Green Goblin in the future that isn’t a techno-Terminator….or a cyber-snow boarder….or a Venom that dies from a goblin grenade….
Well said! =]
As a die-hard life-long fan, it’s been pretty damn frustrating, huh?
And oh man! Don’t even get me started on that Green Goblin. I’m a huge fan of the character, so when I saw he was in a power ranger suit…ugh. And Willam Defoe was totally the perfect choice for Norman. You have arguably the best actor in the franchise and what do they do…they cover his face up so he can’t emote anything! He looks scarier without the helmet!
Entirely too soon to try a restart of a series. I think people still have a bad taste in their mouth from the awful B-Movie that was Spiderman 3. It’s a nice design and maybe if it was taken on later down the road it would be bigger. However it’s going to drown in a summer where you have Avengers and Dark Knight Rises.
It does seem a little too soon. I agree. I can’t deny I’m still excited for it though.
There is nothing to worry about this film is being very true to the original ‘flavor’ of spider-man (no jokes please) . . . dare I say I almost hope for some explosion fest because for me the defining trait about Spidey is the fun factor. A hero with the darkest life and origin story goes on to save lives and be ridiculed by the media, struggle with poverty, repeatedly choose between others and himself and yet does with a SMILE AND WITTY RETORT! THAT IS MY HOPE a Spider-man film that captures his style and persona, it doesn’t necessarily have to be an masterpiece of film and art. I cite Avengers (which had it’s fair share of film flaws) as proof that comic films don’t always have to get the Nolan treatment (no disrespect mean to Nolan)
Personally, I think it’s the perfect time to “reboot” the series, and everything that I’ve seen in the previews shows that it will be far superior to the Sam Raimi “Great Power/Great Responsibility” whiny-ass Tobey McGuire schlockfest. Don’t get me wrong, I liked the first one, but the villains were always horrible. The scenes between Spidey & the Green Goblin lacked any kind of chemistry, the portrayal of Doctor Octopus was severely lacking in any kind of reality or depth, and by the third TERRIBLE episode, they were cramming in very poor versions of the Sandman and Venom (who could have been the greatest villain ever) in the same fashion that they used a campy Schwarzenegger as “Mr. Freeze” in “Batman & Robin.”
This reboot looks much better. I’m looking forward to the banter, the quips, the action and, yes, even the teenage awkwardness of the younger Mr. Parker. The only thing that truly concerns me is the thing about the Parker Parents. (As I recall, that’s the crap that brought us the whole Clone Saga, and that sucked!) The villain is more in line with what you’d come to expect with Spidey, where he has to take responsibility for the unintended consequences of his own actions, and the special effects are generations better than what was done in the McGuire versions. And because it seems to be taking a darker turn, we might actually see some GOOD versions of Spidey’s rogue gallery of villains in the future, such as Venom, Kraven the Hunter and the Green Goblin.
So, personally, I’m looking forward to the movie, and until Carnage becomes a Vegan, Make Mine Marvel!
I agree with all your points and love comic book movies which strive to be accurate. My main thing I’m not liking is the costume. I mean the Raimi one was closer even with the annoying lead raised webbing thing going on.