https://dejareviewer.com/2014/10/14/10-good-sequels-that-sowed-the-seeds-for-their-series-destruction/
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Archived from the IMDb Discussion Forums — Marvel/DC
TMC-4 — 9 years ago(October 07, 2016 06:12 PM)
https://dejareviewer.com/2014/10/14/10-good-sequels-that-sowed-the-seeds-for-their-series-destruction/
5. Spider-Man 2
Its Fatal Flaw: Botching Harry Osborns story
For a while, Spider-Man 2 was my pick for the best superhero film. And then its sequel came out and forced me to rethink that position. In hindsight, you can see a lot of Spider-Man 3s flaws creeping into Spider-Man 2. The long Aunt May monologues, the Mary Jane Watson drama, and the extremely sympathetic villain. All of these things were handled very well in that movie, and its only in comparing it to Spider-Man 3 that I notice how those could have gone wrong.
But even the first time I saw Spider-Man 2, I was troubled by the way it handled Harry Osborns story. Heres a guy whos obsessed with killing Spider-Man only to finally learn that his hated enemy and his best friend are the same person. And in that moment of crisis when Peter Parker could have defused the situation, he clumsily brushed it aside because of Doctor Octopus more imminent threat.
Harry and Peter didn't speak to each other between the second and third films. Peter could have gone right back to Harry after defeating Doc Ock and explain everything to him. But no, the movie instead set up a contrived situation in which these two old friends wouldnt speak at all between the second and third films, giving Harry time to go insane and decide to kill Peter.
Spider-Man 3 didnt need that unnecessary distraction. Venom would have been enough of a threat.
Imagine if Harry and Peter had just patched things up between them when Peter suddenly starts acting more aggressive and its up to Harry to stop the Alien Symbiote from completely sapping Peters strength and soul. Now that would have been a great continuation of Harrys story. -
Xaeden — 9 years ago(December 02, 2016 01:29 PM)
First of all, Venom was not considered as a villain when crafting Harry's story in this movie. Raimi was pressured to include the character after they had started production on the third film, forcing him to try to work Venom into their existing story about Peter's hubris. So Spider-man 2 did not poorly set up that bit in Spider-man 3, Spider-man 3 had a curve ball thrown into it that slightly monkey wretched what Spider-man 2 had set up.
Second of all, the contrived argument is a weak one. People say this all the time; "It's contrived because they didn't just speak to each other and if they spoke to each other all of this could be resolved." Okay, but that's a common facet of real life; how many problems exist in the real world because two people chose not to talk things out? A lot. Why does this happen? People are insecure, they're afraid so why shouldn't they also be those things in fiction? Just because there's a manufactured element to the decision to include a real human problem, people scoff, but how is going in the other directionwhere everyone always acts perfectly and resolves things easilysomehow better?