The Amazing Spider-Man

[Montana Smith]

Looking back, it wasn't one of Frank's finer hours. Interesting, yes, but it really went nowhere since it lasted an entire two issues. A lot more could have been done with the premise: comics' take on Richard Wright's Native Son, for example.



Despite being the closest thing to Batman in the Marvel Universe, I never felt that Frank should interact with superpowered heroes; that is to say, despite holding his own against The Powers That Be, it always feels off. Let Frank deal with street-level crime, and fending off Galactus, Thanos, & Darkseid to The Avengers, the Fantastic Four, & the Justice League.

See the current story-arc on Punisher: War Zone. Frank's dealt with Spider-Man & Black Widow, and he's now being hunted by Thor. Yes, the God of Thunder.

Yes, Frank looked better in combat gear taking down drug dens, than he did in skintight black and white climbing the Statue of Liberty.

Thoughts? Opinions? Your own choices?

Classic red and blue.

But with Spider-Man, I always preferred the villains to Peter Parker himself.

 

[Le Saboteur]

Mods: Can we add a "The" to the title of this thread?

Thank you, Professor.

In other news, if you're a fan of the (now cancelled) titular comic series, check out this guy's blog. He's been writing about his quest to collect each and every issue of The Amazing Spider-Man ever published. I've only casually perused it, but there's a lot of information in there for those of you who are interested in your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man's exploits.

Remember George Clooney's The Descendents? If not, go give it a gander. According to Variety, Sony has Shailene Woodley, the eldest daughter in that movie, at the top of their list to play Mary-Jane Watson.

Did we hit the jackpot, tiger?

She was (is?) in that horrible Secret Life of the American Teenager teevee show, so time will tell if this is good casting choice. Of course, that assumes a deal is eventually done.

The article also indicates that Sony is actively looking for an actor to fill the shoes of Harry Osborn.

 

[kongisking]

I thought the casting decisions on both Mary Jane and Harry had already been announced? I'll admit, I actually want James Franco back. Even before his jump to household-name recognition, he was one of the greatest things about the Raimi films, and far and away had the best character arc of 3.

 

[Le Saboteur]

I thought the casting decisions on both Mary Jane and Harry had already been announced?

And nobody had the temerity of purpose to post that information here? Or, because Spidey isn't The Batman nobody can be bothered with it? But, yes, it looks like the casting of Shailene Woodley was made official by Sony, and they've also confirmed Dane DeHaan has Harry Osborn.

DeHaan was last seen opposite Shia Labouef in Lawless and in the much heralded Chronicle.



In other news, the one-hour premiere of the Ultimate Spider-Man's second season kicks off on Monday, the 21st. Until then, Comic Book Resources has an interview with half of Man of Action's brain trust.

What we sort of knew from the beginning, though some elements needed convincing, is that the comedy really works. We knew that the show as fun, and we knew that the more fun, the better it would be. There was never any doubt -- since it was a Marvel show with Marvel guys and Marvel characters -- that this show would have a lot of action. The question was always where to turn the dial for the comedy. And as we've had kids coming up to the convention booth or writing fan letters, their response has been really great to that. So it was less of a learning curve and more being proven correct. Kids like a little fun with their action, and so do the older fans, much to their surprise. Now we just want to push it a little farther. As somebody who likes comedy, that's a good thing.

Check it out here.

He's (Bendis) a proud papa, now, so he wants everything here to be something his kids would really love.

Or, opt not to. The above comment is usually the death knell of animated works.

Too bad it still doesn't seem to have a groovy theme song like The Spectacular Spider-Man did!

 

[Montana Smith]

And nobody had the temerity of purpose to post that information here? Or, because Spidey isn't The Batman nobody can be bothered with it?
...

In other news, the one-hour premiere of the Ultimate Spider-Man's second season kicks off on Monday, the 21st.

Didn't see any of the first season. Also didn't want to leave Spidey out in the cold, at the expense of Batman, so I did get hold of Lego's first Ultimate Spider-Man set. Iron Fist, held captive in Doctor Octopus' lair is rescued by Spider-Man!

Lego recently released the second and third sets: Daily Bugle Showdown and Spider-Cycle Chase. So Spider-Man resorts to a motorcycle and Nick Fury to a flying car in the series?

 

[Le Saboteur]

So Spider-Man resorts to a motorcycle and Nick Fury to a flying car in the series?

Spider-Man had a dune buggy at one point in time; the appropriately named Spider Buggy, of course. I could never understand why your friendly neighborhood wall-crawler needed a dune buggy, let alone a freaking Spider-Cycle. But, yes, in the series Spider-Man has a Spider-Cycle that has been "optimized to traverse any surface" and can shoot its own webbing for anchoring and what not.

Though, I suppose it makes more sense than giving a character who can already fly a jetpack.*

Not idea about Nick Fury's flying car. He's usually on S.H.E.I.L.D.'s helicarrier the whole time. The few times he was out and about, he was walking. So I don't know where the flying car comes from. It could appear in one of the final eight episodes I need to watch.

*-Of course it makes sense. They want to sell toys.

Going back to the movie for a moment: While the first hour was very thoughtful in setting up Parker's origins, the entire second and third act were truncated. For example, what happened to Peter's parents? Where did Mr. Ratha get off to? The reptile SWAT team?

While browsing around for a possible hint, I came across this article that suggests ordered 11th hour edits and/or re-shoots. How? Well, through all of the original trailers Sony released.

2. The Vanishing Villain, or, The Mysterious Disappearance of Evil Mr. Ratha.

One story that did get tied up in the original cut of the film is Mr. Ratha?s. In the finished film Ratha gets attacked by the Lizard on the bridge and then... is gone. You have to wonder how this guy doesn?t put two and two together and realize the giant rampaging lizardman might be related to the world-class herpetologist specializing in cross-species DNA merging who he has been berating.

 

[Montana Smith]

Spider-Man had a dune buggy at one point in time; the appropriately named Spider Buggy, of course. I could never understand why your friendly neighborhood wall-crawler needed a dune buggy, let alone a freaking Spider-Cycle. But, yes, in the series Spider-Man has a Spider-Cycle that has been "optimized to traverse any surface" and can shoot its own webbing for anchoring and what not.

I just had to check out his buggy!

10 Memorable Occasions Spider-Man Acted Like A Nutjob

9. Spider-Man gets a Spider-Buggy

For an extremely brief period in his history, Spider-Man experimented with his own car that was gifted to him by an auto company. To the superhero's credit, he was incredibly dubious of this "Spider-Mobile" in the first place. On the other hand, he did have the poor taste to ride it around town.

http://io9.com/5921736/10-memorable-occasions-spider+man-acted-like-a-nutjob

 

[Le Saboteur]

You mean our movie didn't completely suck?!

Early impressions of the video game tie-in, however, aren't quite as kind.

Before firing up The Amazing Spider-Man I knew absolutely nothing regarding the developer, Beenox -- that is, aside from the fact that they'd made a couple other Spider-Man games and a whole slew of movie tie-ins.

Having played a few hours, I understand why: It's not that good. Fun, yes, but they haven't managed to capture the character the way Rocksteady has with The Batman. With time, I imagine they could. But, considering Activision's timetables, I suspect they don't have that luxury.

The Good: Like the Marquise de Sade said, movement is Nature's most beautiful quality, and Spider-Man moves beautifully. Web slinging feels weighty and true-to-form, while the transition animations are exceptionally fluid.

The Meh: The voice acting is a mixed bag. Whoever is playing Spidey does a good job, but the rest of the cast feels like they're phoning it in. Nolan North as Alistair Smythe, for example. He managed to disappear so completely into The Penguin, but here his normal (?) voice is so easily identifiable.

Perhaps more damning though, is the change of Rhino & The Scorpion from superpowered humans into cross-species eliminates their personality entirely. Now they're just things to beat up in a rather ordinary fashion.

The Bad: The combat system was lifted whole cloth from Rocksteady's Batman games. Adapting the free-slow system for Spider-Man should be a no-brainer, but it feels unrefined and repetitive.

Aside from Spider-Man himself, who looks good, the rest of the graphics leave a lot to be desired. Especially this late into the console cycle. Manhattan is particularly bland in terms of appearance and streetmosphere.

How many useless collectibles can one developer cram into a game? I swear there's about a thousand of 'em. From 700 or so comic book pages to a couple hundred "tech pieces," "magazines," & "audio evidence" there's no reason for any of it to really exist except in an effort to bolster that game time.

More to come, true believers!

 

[Indy's brother]

You mean our movie didn't completely suck?!

Yes. It did.

But how did this meme make me hate the movie even more? And somehow conjure up a feeling akin to pity for Emma Stone?

 

[featofstrength]

that's exactly how I reacted to news of Emma's sex tape.

 

[Indy's brother]

that's exactly how I reacted to news of Emma's sex tape.

Me too, after reading that comment!

Until I looked it up and saw a few awkward seconds of her totally not enjoying herself at the hands of some creepy old guy that could pass for a present day Henry Winkler.

Now I can't unsee it. So please excuse me while I go find a powerdrill to ram into my eye-sockets.

 

[Le Saboteur]

Honestly, I think it has a lot to do with control.

I can agree with this. Except that I think the control in question is "who's going to control the film rights?" With the rights to Daredevil, The Punisher, Luke Cage & Blade (?) having reverted back to Disney-Marvel, Sony was probably under intense pressure to get something done before they also lost their rights.

Spider-Man is, obviously, a money machine; given Sony's recent financial woes, I suspect that they want to keep that lifeline open. That thought is only emboldened by the fact that Sony relinquished all television rights to Spider-Man back in '09(?) leading to the cancellation of The Spectacular Spider-Man and The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes.

Yeah -- there's the comment I remember: Sony relinquished all television rights in exchange for some (unannounced) concession vis-a-vis the live action Spider-Man features.

Current animation productions are being produced in-house by Marvel-Disney despite outsourcing the actual animation to the ROK. You would think they could keep that department domestically given all of the starving artists out there. See: Ultimate Spider-Man, Avengers: Assemble, and the forthcoming Incredible Hulk series.

So, anyway, it was both easier and cheaper to let Raimi & Co. walk in order to start from scratch.

blah, blah, blah Emma Stone, blah, blah, blah

The homers are in full effect today.

Yes. It did.

Do tell. Or, stick to rending your flesh over the lack of Natzee's in future installments of Indiana Jones and how The Beards are personally doing you a disservice by not announcing/actively working on/whatever Indiana Jones 5.

 

[Indy's brother]

Do tell. Or, stick to rending your flesh over the lack of Natzee's in future installments of Indiana Jones and how The Beards are personally doing you a disservice by not announcing/actively working on/whatever Indiana Jones 5.

Ok, Peter Parker is annoying, even as Spider-man, and for a real-life couple (which I just found out as recently as reading this thread yesterday), there was ZERO onscreen chemistry between them. Did we really need a separate/new origin story on the bigscreen for this superhero? Only if it could blow the doors off of the last stab at it. Which it did not. It was limp. As limp as your flimsy attempt to work in a dig about my feelings over a movie that doesn't exist with my feelings over a movie I actually have seen.