Leading Up to No Way Home: Day 2 – Spider-Man 2

Picking up today where we left off with my favorite movie in the Sam Raimi trilogy – Spider-Man 2. This movie has so many great aspects and fewer problems than I remember, so this article will be a bit shorter than the one for Spider-Man. Spider-Man 2 stars Tobey Maguire, Alfred Molina, James Franco, and Kirsten Dunst.

Jack’s Score – 86/100 | Rotten Tomatoes – 93% | Audience – 82% | IMDb – 7.3/10

Spider-Man 2 kicks off with Peter Parker working for Joe’s Pizza. Because he’s constantly being pulled into the action as Spider-Man, he isn’t reliable anywhere else, including his job. As a result he has to get pizzas across town in 8 minutes, which leads to a really fun sequence of Spider-Man swinging through the city with a stack of pizzas. Still, he doesn’t make it in time and is fired as a result. This is a great start to the movie not only because it’s fun, but because it also provides the basis for Peter’s internal conflict in this movie as he struggles to balance his two identities.

We go on to see him struggling in many other aspects of his life, including his work for the Daily Bugle, his financial and living situations, his relationships with Aunt May and his friends, and his education. After this he meets Doctor Otto Octavius, a scientist working on a renewable energy project for Harry and OsCorp. Octavius is blunt with Peter, as he heard from one of Peter’s professors that he’s “intelligent, but lazy.” He tells Peter about his project and is impressed with his display of understanding. Then, we see him tell Peter about the importance of finding love. This is an interesting detail as it serves two purposes: to spurn Peter’s turmoil about balancing his life and to inform the audience of Octavius’ stabilizing force in life.

At the first public test of his project, Octavius reveals a set of robotic arms that are designed to assist him with the project. After the project goes wrong, his wife ends up dead and the robotic limbs are fused to his spine. In that process, the AI in the arms corrupts his mind and turns him into a mad man desperate to correct his work. J. Jonah Jameson then names him Doc Ock. Spider-Man saves Harry, which only serves to enrage his hated for the hero. Later, Peter has promised Mary Jane that he would come see her show. On the way there he is forced to jump in as Spider-Man yet again, making him late for the show and given no admittance. After sitting out and waiting for MJ, he sees her meet up with her boyfriend, later revealed to by J. Jonah Jameson’s son. Afterward, his powers fail while swinging through the city. His power issues continue until he decides to give up as Spider-Man altogether. He makes this decision through a conversation in his head with Uncle Ben.

After he gives up the hero game, we see Peter’s life improve. He’s doing well in school, mending his relationships, and isn’t worrying about everyone else all the time. Harry, meanwhile, has thrown himself into finding Spider-Man following the public failure of Doc Ock’s energy fusion. Peter has no struggles with his decision to give up the mask until he runs up on a burning building and finds out there is still a child trapped inside. He saves the child but later finds out that another person was trapped as well, and they never made it out. He begins to realize that his decision is hurting other people and he has responsibilities that extend beyond his own interests. This is further seen in a conversation Aunt May has with Peter about Spider-Man. I’m convinced that she knew the two were one in the same here as she encourages the return of Spider-Man in a way that was meant for him to hear. This conversation is probably my favorite scene in the movie.

Despite Peter’s desire to return, his powers are still failing him. His head simply isn’t in the right space for him to return to hero work. Meanwhile, Doc Ock has reassembled his experiment and is in need of a rare element that Harry supplied to him. Harry strikes a deal to give him the element in exchange for Spider-Man, alive. Ock decides uses Peter to track Spidey down, since he takes the pictures for the paper and seems to have a good read on where the webslinger is going to be. As a bargaining chip, Doc Ock kidnaps Mary Jane. This was the motivation Peter needed. His powers return and he goes after them. It also leads to a great moment from J. Jonah Jameson where he reflects on the idea that he might have driven Spider-Man away and that it’s his fault that Mary Jane got kidnapped. That is, until Spider-Man steals his suit right off of Jameson’s wall and returns as the Masked Menace.

The following fight scene is likely one of the best in movie history, as Spider-Man chases down Doc Ock to a clock tower and then follows him through the city, culminating on a fight on a moving train. The sequence is excellently choreographed and does a great job of conveying the power levels and abilities of both characters. After Doc Ock realizes he’s losing the fight, he turns the train into a run-away by sabotaging the controls. Peter puts everything he has into saving the train, rendering him unconscious. Once again, the theme of the city coming to Spider-Man’s aid is displayed as the train passengers stop him from falling and pass him into the train car, moving him overhead. Peter, unmasked, lays at the feet of dozens of New Yorkers, who reflect on how young he is and perhaps someone they wouldn’t expect to be Spider-Man. After Peter comes to, they return his mask and promise to keep his identity a secret. This moment really encapsulates Spider-Man’s relationship with his city and highlights the key aspects of the character, namely his self-sacrifice for others.

At this point, Doc Ock returns to the train, now with the upper hand and takes Spider-Man, delivering him to Harry. Harry discovers Peter’s identity and Peter regains consciousness before Harry can decide if he still wants to kill Spider-Man. After finding out Doc Ock’s plan and location from Harry, Peter races off to stop him and save MJ. Doc Ock uses the mass of Tridium that he got from Harry to power his machine. Because he got a much larger amount than the first time, the fusion reaction becomes self sustaining and goes critical almost immediately. In the ensuing fight with Peter, his robotic arms are damaged and his mind is cleared. he realizes his error and sacrifices himself to destroy the device, completing one of the best villain arcs put to screen. MJ also finds out Peter’s identity in the chaos.

A couple of the final story beats include Harry finding his father’s lair for his Green Goblin equipment, setting up his role in the third movie and Peter and MJ coming together despite his wish to keep her out of this mess. This, however, is my one main critique of the movie, as she leaves Jameson’s son at the altar for Peter. I don’t think that character deserved that, since he was nothing but a stand-up guy throughout the movie. It’s also not as sweet of a moment as the story thinks it is. Once again, much of Peter’s interaction with MJ is uncomfortable, clunky, and fails to paint either character in a good light.

Regardless, this movie is a great improvement from the first and tells an excellent story. The special effects hold up well here as well. Overall, I highly recommend that everyone see this movie, and I’m looking forward to Alfred Molina as Doc Ock again next week even more so than Willem Dafoe’s reprisal.

#Marvel #Movies #SpiderMan