Spiderman: the 20th Anniversary
The Blind Eternities forum
Posted on Jan. 10, 2022, 6:45 p.m. by DemonDragonJ
This year marks the twentieth anniversary of Spiderman, the first film in Sam Raimi’s Spiderman trilogy, the significance of which is truly monumental.
The first X-Men film, released two years prior, had dispelled the idea that live-action movies adapted from comics were unprofitable (an idea that had arisen mainly due to the campiness of 1997’s Batman and Robin) and showed that they could be serious stories with well-written plots and well-developed characters, but this film was the one that truly caused a boom in comic book movies, helping them break into mainstream media and become household names. The characters were believable and relatable, the villains were threatening without being overpowered, and the emotional conflicts that the heroes experienced were ones with which the audience could identify and sympathize. Today, movies adapted from comics are ubiquitous (and, frankly, I feel that the market is being saturated), but, at the time at which this movie was released, they were still a rarity, so this movie’s impact upon popular culture was immense.
Given the massive success of this film, it was inevitable that it would have a sequel, which was just as beloved as was the first, and there was even a third installment, which, sadly, fell victim to the curse that seemed to plague nearly every third installment of a movie series at that time: attempting to do too much in too little time (see also X-Men 3, Shrek the Third, and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End for other examples of this unfortunate phenomenon; fortunately, however, both the Lord of the Rings trilogy and Star Wars prequel trilogy avoided that curse), which ended the franchise, only for it to be rebooted twice in less than a decade.
What does everyone else here say about this? What are your thoughts about this year being the 20th anniversary of Spiderman?
DemonDragonJ says... #3
TypicalTimmy, someone online pointed out that both Peter and Aunt May were younger in successive universe, so they joked that that next reboot would have a college-aged Aunt May and an elementary school-aged Peter.
January 11, 2022 8:17 p.m.
As fun as this trilogy was originally it doesn't hold up very well.
January 14, 2022 12:27 p.m.
TypicalTimmy says... #5
I guess Kevin Fiegie or however it is spelled said Spiderman will be the "heart and soul" of the MCU moving forward?
Keeps it in line with the comics. Parker also has a very long history of being a tragic hero, where he loses everyone and everything over and over again. Glad to see we actually have that in the movies. It wouldn't surprise me if they introduce a Gewn Stacy only to kill her off, as in Amazing Spiderman 2.
Like, if Peter meets Gewn and feels a cosmic pull to protect her at all costs because he knows Andrew Garfield's Spiderman had a Gewn who was "his MJ". And he knows he lost her. So Tom's feels responsible to protect her.
But his constant need to protect her is what puts her in danger, and ultimately kills her.
January 14, 2022 12:59 p.m. Edited.
DemonDragonJ says... #6
Another fact that may make older viewers feel their age is that Toby Maguire is now the same age that Willem Dafoe was when he (Dafoe) starred in the first Sipderman movie; can you believe that?
TypicalTimmy says... #2
Now that the MCU wrapped up their third Spidy movie with Tom Holland, I wonder who they're going to cast for the next reboot?
January 11, 2022 3:54 p.m.