Spidey 3

I will be king
And you
You will be queen
Though nothing will
Drive them away
We can beat them
Just for one day
We can be Heroes
Just for one day

And you
You can be mean
And I
I'll drink all the time
'Cause we're lovers
And that is a fact
Yes we're lovers
And that is that

Though nothing
Will keep us together
We could steal time
Just for one day
We can be Heroes
For ever and ever
What d'you say

David Bowie - Heroes

WARNING: SPOILER ALERT!

So I finally saw Spiderman 3. And you know what? I really enjoyed the movie. Some of the fastest 2 and a half hours I've ever spent in a theater. Okay, now let me expand on this. The fight scenes in the movie were dazzling and the special effects were just jaw dropping. The movie probably had some of the best visuals I have ever seen, if not the best. From the creation of the Sandman, to the Spiderman-Green Goblin aerial battle, to the Sandman-Spiderman subterranean battle, all were incredible in their own-right. Wonderfully choreographed, and planned to the every detail. The fight scenes themselves were worth the price of admission.
The fight scenes, though, were the only saving grace of the movie. Good thing there were a ton of them. The plot and script were sub-par. I loved the whole black-spiderman angle, but the random torso shots of Tobey Maguire walking down the street and the whole jazz club scene were highly unnecessary. And the poto devices used in the movie were just a little too convenient. Harry losing his memory for a bit, that random sand truck parked in New York City. Why the hell would a random truck full of sand just be fucking sitting there?? And was it ever really satisfactorily explained why Mary Jane broke-up with Peter just cause Harry threatened her? That part made no sense (more on that break-up in a bit). And the foreshadowing of Harry's death was stupid. As soon as he said "I'd die for my friends" you knew he was gone. But why foreshadow it? Why not have his death be a surprise? And what's with the Sandman? One minute he doesn't want to be bad, then he's throwing around innocent people like they're stuffed animals, the next moment he's repentant again? And what about Spiderman getting beat half-to-death then miraculously getting back to his feet in condition to fight? Seriously? As an audience, do we really look that stupid? C'mon Raimi, give us more respect than that.
To be fair, certain parts of the move were actually good. The whole break-up was, in my opinion, well done. I was pissed off at MJ for being a cheating whore, but the awkwardness shared between the two was well-written and realistic in the "lack-of-communication" sense (even if the restaurant scene played out like something out of a cartoon). The events leading up to their eventual split are distinctly shown (I especially love the scene at the parade thing where the whole crowd is cheering for Spiderman and Stacy to kiss and a little boy yells out "Spiderman, no!", funny shit) and there were many scenes where I just wanted to yell at both Spiderman and MJ and be like "what the fuck is wrong with both of you??" And that's the way it should be.
The contrast between the good and bad Harry was also impeccably done. The division between his two sides is created through an excellent use of make-up, facial expressions, and lighting. Overall, the Harry Osborn character was well portrayed. The ultimate failing of the movie, though, may have been its villains. If we've learned one thing from super hero movies it's that the hero itself doesn't matter. It's all about the villain. Willem Dafoe And Alfred Molina in the first two Spiderman movies respectively, Ian McKellan and Brian Cox in X-Men 1 and 2 respectively, Kevin Spacey in the new Superman, even Hackman in the original Superman. You NEED a good bad guy. This is another reason X-3 was such a tremendous piece of douche: there was NO discernible bad guy that viewers could point to. In Spiderman 3 we have one bad bad-guy (Venom/Eddie Brock), one bad-guy that redeems himself at the end (Sandman) and one bad-guy who is really good (Green Goblin/Harry Osborn). So Sandman and Green Goblin, at times in the movie, are both good? Well who the hell are we supposed to cheer for/against then? That leaves Venom for us to cheer against. I liked the Venom character. The CGI or whatever used to create him was straight fucking awesome. My problem with Venom, though, might have been the casting. Topher Grace is a good actor (he does a real good job in Traffic). But the thing is, whenever I saw him on screen, all I could think was "hey, it's Eric from That 70's Show!" Does he need to be typecast? Certainly not. There are many roles he can pull-off. But the sinister Venom is simply not one of them. In all honesty, Venom may have been the most difficult role to cast in the movie. And though Topher was not totally awful, he just wasn't a very believable Venom. Why not get some muscle-bound dick? Or at least someone who is more believable as an ass-hole. And yeah, I can't really think of anyone right now either. But isn't that the casting director's job?
The thing with Spiderman 3 is that though it may have been the darkest of the movies, it was also by-far the most cartoon-y of the three movies. There were people switching sides, random mutations and super hero team-ups. And after the first two movies, people were not expecting a switch to a cartoonish version of Spiderman, complete with comedic scenes (which, for the most part, were not really that amusing). My plan going into the movie was to enter with low expectations, and the movie ended up being much better than I thought it would be. But if people entered the theater expecting a certain level of writing and plot development akin to the first two movies, I can understand why they would be disappointed. Spiderman 3 is clearly the weakest of the three movies. But if you can ignore the plot-holes, the failed character improvement, the inconsistencies, and the random absurdities of the movie, at least you will get some of the best fight scenes to ever grace the screen. And for me, all I really wanted out of the movie was Spiderman and Venom duking it out amongst the office buildings of Manhattan. And in that regard, at least, Spiderman 3 did not disappoint.