It has been only a short ten years since Sam Raimi brought our favourite arachnid to the big screen - and this instantly leaves us with the question of just how innovative this new telling of the story can really be.
While the initial plot, though dressed up, remains the same, director Marc Webb does make some notable changes, the most obvious being a change in the love interest; Red-headed girl next door, Mary-Jane Watson is replaced by yellow-haired Gwen Stacey, who alas, still reminds us of Mary Jane – now donning a blonde wig.
Webb has the upper-hand with visuals, as special effects have come on a long way in the past ten years. With the addition of 3D, the film is truly spectacular making the climax one of the most thrilling climaxes to come from Hollywood yet.
One of this action fantasy's greatest assets is its actors: Andrew Garfield, Rhys Ifans and Sally Field all give charismatic and sympathetic performances which help a rather thin and stretched-out story move a little faster.
2002's
Spiderman was one of the very first films to start up the modern phenomenon of comic-book movies. Luckily for him, Raimi got there first and since his adaptation was such a strong one, it was always going to be a difficult wall to climb over.
Ultimately, this new offering of Spiderman may be thoroughly entertaining and even thrilling in parts, but offers very little to the webbed crusader's world that we haven't seen before and nothing new to the Marvel Universe.
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