So here are where, in what is now 2017. Call me a traitor, but I've just seen
Spider-Man 3 like twice before and during my winter vacation in Amsterdam and Berlin with my parents and my sister. Not only will it be the 10th anniversary of Sam Raimi's final
Spider-Man film in 4 months, but it is also the year where we finally have the first
Spider-Man movie to be under the Marvel Cinematic Universe banner (while Sony still retains the movie distribution rights to the character) to hopefully achieve the success that the
Amazing Spider-Man films have failed at.
Following my first viewing at
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 after completing my spring semester at NOVA college, I thought for sure that it was gonna be better and actually wipe away the bad taste of
Spider-Man 3 like the first film (the 2012 reboot starring Andrew Garfield) thanks to a couple of things that I know has plagued pretty much everything that was well-remembered in the first two films. But after learning that its $709 million gross didn't satisfy Sony and that plans for an Amazing Spider-Man 3 and its spin-offs were put on hold until the Sony-Marvel deal a year later, I was very upset with it and I even blamed
Spider-Man 3 for being so bad (as most people would say) that a reboot had to happen before next thing they know, the studio had no confidence that they were gonna make a direct follow-up happen immediately. Since then I've been coming up on comments on sites like YouTube saying stuff like "the trilogy is better than ASM" and "I would watch Spider-Man 3 over Amazing Spider-Man". After seeing how the time-traveling in
X-Men: Days of Future Past retconned all of the events that leads to the futuristic war with the deadly Sentinels, including the disastrous and anti-climatic
X-Men: The Last Stand, I became so obsessed to finding which of the sequels/follow-ups that were so bad or very forgettable (
Spider-Man 3 was one of the them) I would declare them as non-existent which would spare the more enjoyable ones from being tainted. After all, we all dislike the Emo Peter Parker moments as well as the Uncle Ben death Sandman retcon and Topher Grace playing Venom, don't we? But while I was getting pretty annoyed by the whole "Spider-Man 3 is better than Amazing Spider-Man" this and that, I came upon the unexpected source claiming that the novelization was better than the movie because it fleshes out the characters' motivations and contains some missing scenes that can be found in the
Spider-Man 3.1 extended cut that fans have been petitioning for. But I didn't believe a single word of them, so I desperately searched for more evidence of what makes
Spider-Man 3 better than the
Amazing Spider-Man movies and if it truly plagued the greatness of 1 and 2 like it happened before with the original
X-Men films. When I finished up reading the
Spider-Man 3 novel that I got for Christmas in TWO DAYS, I discovered that there are a lot of pages with several written lines that may help clarify the ridiculous amount of plot holes that I know are what made SM3 the most disliked installment in the trilogy such as the frail butler telling Harry the truth about Norman Osborn's death two movies too late, the purpose with the random demolecularization machine that turned Flint Marko into Sandman, Mary Jane's bitchy attitude including why she didn't bother telling Peter that Harry made her broke up with him to "save his life" at the bridge, and whether or not the Sandman retcon diminishes the entire reason that Peter Parker became Spider-Man since the first film as much as Sam Raimi did it to incorporate the forgiveness moral and connect Sandman to Peter's life. I underlined phrases and sentences in the book that I find most helpful in assuring me that not every character in
Spider-Man 3 were entirely stupid nor are their subplots really unnecessary when it comes to "too many characters." At first, I wasn't convinced if that'll be enough to make it far from the worst movie that everybody thought it was before the ASM films. But when I thought about the other blockbuster threequels that were not everybody's favorites while still having moments fun to watch and were decent enough to conclude their trilogies, such as
X-Men: Apocalypse and
Iron Man 3, I realized that maybe I was being too hard on
Spider-Man 3 after all. I mean, I know that minus the Venom and Gwen Stacy characters, everything in that are all conceived by Sam Raimi himself before having a difficult relationship with the studio which resulted in the cancellation of Spider-Man 4. Plus, it did have some pretty spectacular moments, like Spider-Man saving Gwen from the building wrecked by a malfunctioning crane, his fights with Sandman, and Spidey and New Goblin working together to battle Sandman and Venom, that at least felt like they share with Spider-Man 1 and 2 in a more cohesive way unlike the ones where Andrew Garfield take on the Lizard, Electro, and the too-little-too-late Green Goblin and the Rhino. While we didn't get a Spider-Man 4 as planned, at least the critically-mixed trilogy closure didn't resort itself to too much sequel-teasing which would require whatever amount of money it needs to recoup its very expensive budget based on the word-of-mouth. Perhaps I was a little too focused on the "what it could have been" scenario to hopefully make
Spider-Man 3 not much of a depressing trilogy ending like I thought, given that it came out a year after the disappointing
X-Men 3 which was so bad that Bryan Singer had to be brought back for DOFP to undo the mistakes that the Brett Ratner-directed threequel made. Because there do appear to be some fans wanting a 3.1 cut which is right now 10 years too long, I think the only way that
Spider-Man 3 would be an acceptable entry in the trilogy without being too bothered by the noticeable flaws is if they'd only excised or fast-forward parts that I know almost hurt our most beloved web-slinging hero and future Avenger, including the Emo Parker dancing scenes and the very painful-to-hear lines like "How's the pie? So good," and "Look at Goblin Jr. Are you gonna cry?" And if it is to be less depressing conclusion to the trilogy and end on a worthy note like
Return of the Jedi and
The Dark Knight Rises, I would totally add a final swing scene to complete the pattern that was clearly been used in 1 and 2 that Raimi and the studio somehow didn't bother putting in after going through a lot of craziness of stuff that they know that not everything has to be "bigger and better" (especially the rehashed Pete/MJ relationship problems and Peter being so melodramatic that he is clearly not how we want to see Spider-Man acting that way). It's just that I feel like the "Go get 'em, tiger" ending in
Spider-Man 2 is the happy ending and the conclusion to Peter's difficult journey of balancing his normal life and his superhero gig we so rightfully deserve! Heck, the novelization that I read even ended with Spider-Man swinging through the buildings with Mary Jane in his arms despite suffering a tragic loss that is their best friend Harry Osborn who died saving Peter from Venom's "carnage"! Now THAT would have been a great way to end the trilogy (if they really filmed that scene) than just have Peter and M.J. dance slowly together in the jazz club! When I read the part where Peter thought about still continuing his Spider-Man mantle when he learned that he was not directly responsible (like he told Aunt May in SM2) for his uncle's death since it was Sandman who (though, accidentally) shot him, which lessens the impact that works effectively well in the first film in the same way as the comic book if that retcon didn't happen, I thought that perhaps it wasn't really such a pointless change after all when I think about Joker being the killer of Bruce Wayne's parents in Tim Burton's
Batman and Two-Face's role in the death of Dick Grayson's family in
Batman Forever, which I don't mind if that's the way it's gonna be when it comes to comic book movies being different from the comics that they were based on. The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a perfect example of that. And if Jesse Eisenberg's over-the-top take on Lex Luthor, Jr. and the Cave Troll lookalike Doomsday in
Batman v Superman taught me something, maybe I should accept Topher Grace's portrayal of Eddie Brock (now matter how shoehorned he is as Venom) if Sam Raimi wanted an anti-Peter Parker, if only that I would block that goofy teeth makeup of his every time he unmasks to speak out of my head. I still think that the animated shows handled Venom with great ease to really make him a huge (and I mean HUGE!) threat to Peter and all that he has hold dear to him! And that we could have had more of the Black-Suited Spider-Man action like the trailers had promised instead of going through more of the Emo Parker nonsense!
That doesn't mean that I "like"
Spider-Man 3. I still see it as my least favorite
Spider-Man film, just not in a "so bad I want to erase it from my mind" attitude, the same way like I feel towards god-awful films like Shyamalan's
The Last Airbender and
Battlefield Earth. If a
Spider-Man 3.1 version does get released sometime in the future, then it might be the next
Alien 3 Assembly Cut which is of course a third installment of the series that was considered inferior to the excellent previous 2 predecessors while greatly improved by a number of added scenes that better fleshes out underdeveloped characters. I am so glad that I asked my sister that I would like a
Spider-Man 3 novelization book from Amazon for Christmas. Right now, the REAL #1 worst movie in the world for me is:.... (drum roll)
Fant-4-stic! Fox, and even Josh Trank, should never have made the Fantastic Four so dark and mopey! So I guess as Peter would say to Flint: "I forgive you."
I pray that
Spider-Man: Homecoming will overcome the fatigue-ish
Amazing Spider-Man problems and be exactly what made Spider-Man our favorite Marvel superhero of all time since 2004's
Spider-Man 2! And even if it's not Tobey Maguire or Andrew Garfield, whose franchise will now stay unfinished and forgotten thanks to its poor box office returns and lukewarm response while the former's trilogy will be frequently remembered for launching the golden age of superhero movies, there can be no doubt that Tom Holland will do a much better job and prove that he is the Spider-Man we truly deserve in the still-going-strong Marvel Cinematic Universe!
