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Spider-Man 2002 vs. Spider-Man 1992 275

Posted by michael from the spidey-senses-tingling dept.
Surly Robot writes "Do you like your Spider-Man CG or non-CG? Here's an article that I wrote for the Baltimore City Paper about the guy who made his own Spidey flick ten years ago, and what he thinks of the new movie." Another submitter sent in a link to view Green Goblin's Last Stand (Microsoft format unfortunately, but it works with Codeweavers).
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Spider-Man 2002 vs. Spider-Man 1992 More

Spider-Man 2002 vs. Spider-Man 1992

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  • CG (Score:1)

    by thaigan ( 197773 )
    He'll definitely seem cooler; however, spidey 1992 will have a significant advantage as he is 10 years younger!

  • the older spidey is sexier too (Score:3, Funny)

    by TR6 ( 577489 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @11:34AM (#3457464)
    as a man, i can definately say that the older cartoon spidey is soo much sexier than the new... oh wait, i cant write this... this is wrong, thats just a cartoon, i shouldnt feel that way about a cartoon character, letalone a Male cartoon character... oh man, this is too much. i cant take it any more.

  • CG is great (Score:5, Interesting)

    by EvilAlien ( 133134 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @11:36AM (#3457476) Journal
    I'm no ludite. Technology is letting filmakers realize dreams that could only be slightly approximated back in tha day.

    Fantastic stories and imagination should not be contrained by mere reality, computers let creative truly push the envelope.

    • Exactly! Without CG, hollywood wouldn't be making this movie at all. The proof is, that it hasn't been made for the bigscreen yet!
    • I agree, however

      I don't like how many of these movies have the great cg effects with a poor plot and bad acting. I would compare it to the advances in video game graphics. Back in the day, you had to make a playable game cause the graphics sucked. Now, I see way too often games that are great eye candy, but the game sucks.

      I think in the same way that the playability of video games can suffer because the programmers aren't as worried about it because of the cool graphics could be analagous to a filmmaker not as worried about the plot/acting because of the great effects.

    • Re:CG is great (Score:5, Interesting)

      by mccalli ( 323026 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @11:52AM (#3457571) Homepage
      I'm no ludite.

      I am.

      Technology is letting filmakers realize dreams that could only be slightly approximated back in tha day.

      Well...maybe. But then again, maybe not. These new CG thingies date really fast. Have you ever looked at some of the old games you used to worship, and think "huh?". Doom is a great example - stunning in its day, still playable today, but the graphics are now considered poor. That was only six or seven years ago.

      You see, I'm of a school that still prefers models for special effects. Take the geek's bible of a film, Star Wars, as a great example. The rehashed Special Edition nonsense already had 'CG' leaping out at you from every turn, and it's so blindingly obvious when it appears. The original, apart from one bad 'airfix' moment when Luke skims over the Death Star, has barely dated. The models and machines look better than the easily-spottable CG bits.

      There are other examples. Last Starfighter anyone? Fantastic graphics for the day, awful for today. Babylon 5? Same thing (plot rescues it, but look at the obvious animated texture mapping particularly in the pilot). Terminator 2's reflective surface morphing? Lost its shine a bit, hasn't it? Titanic? Hmm...an awfully straight ship, wasn't it? Those railings must have been aligned with laser sights.

      Entirely self-contained CG films, like Toy Story or Shrek, have a much better chance of long-term survival in my opion because there's no point of reference to the real world. However, for me real world+CG dates faster than real world+model.

      Cheers,
      Ian

      • Re:CG is great (Score:3, Interesting)

        by cjpez ( 148000 )
        Yup. Just take a look at Yoda from the original Star Wars trilogy. He's infinitely more believable than the CG characters of today. It's a shame to see models and puppets go away.

      • Re:CG is great (Score:4, Interesting)

        by EvilAlien ( 133134 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @12:22PM (#3457749) Journal
        Personally, I feel much the same way about the models and puppets you prefer. The stiff movements and lack of (approximately) realisitic body language in the Yoda puppet is dissapointing today given the range of communication CG can produce. Models and puppets date themselves just as quickly as CG.

        Everything gets old and passe, this shouldn't be a surprise. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't support innovation just because it won't stay top-of-the-line forever. Nothing does.

        I really don't understand the aversion to CG when models and puppets are used as a "timeless FX" defence. Something which lacks the dynamics of a living being, such as a mere puppet, gets old quicker than current CG, IMO.

        Life is change, we have to cope with that.

        • The stiff movements and lack of (approximately) realisitic body language in the Yoda puppet is dissapointing today given the range of communication CG can produce.
          Nevermind CG. Have you seen the puppeteering Jim Henson's Creature Shop are doing nowadays? Creatures like Pilot on "Farscape" contain no CG, but are still amazingly lifelike, especially compared to The Original Yoda.

          I think Jim Henson's Creature Shop is an amazing outfit. They combine CG, animatronics and traditional (as it is) puppetry, and it usually ends up in a show or movie with actual plots.

      • Re:CG is great (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Ralph Wiggam ( 22354 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @12:44PM (#3457903) Homepage
        I was watching The Dark Crystal a while ago, for the first time as an adult (sorta). The film is just beautiful and amazing. It made me sad to think that no movie will be made like that ever again.

        Good effects are never going to make a movie with poor storytelling good. And no matter what technique is used for the effects, if they're used properly to complement a good story, you'll probably end up with a good film.

        -B
        • Not necessarily will no movie ever be made like that again. Just look at any episode of Farscape to see that most of the time they use real honest-to-goodness "puppets" (if that's still a politically correct term) in lieu of CG. Granted, the puppetry can get a bit cheesy, but it's good work fitting of being made by the company Jim Henson created. And yes, it's not a movie but it still shows that CG isn't taking over completely.

          On the other hand, I'm still a huge fan of a good CG scene now and then, though. In order to save posts, shame on whoever posted and commented on entirely CG movies and didn't mention Final Fantasy. If we all can try not to slam it for a second, I still think it was a spectacular use of the software available and all in all did come very close in places to looking real.
      • It's interesting how you hand picked some of the examples. Sure some may seem dated but others are have hold up. Other examples are really mistaken. You know that for the most part the Titanic ship was a model? I guess it's a compliment to the model builders at Digital Domin that you said how straight it was. The Phantom Menace contained numerous amounts of model work. It was ILM's biggest model project ever. Probably the only thing that'll surpass it will be Episode 2. And I don't follow how the T1000 has lost it's shine, doesn't make any sense.

        As far as dated things do we really want to go back to the days with strobing stop motion, noticeable matte lines, or static a few seconds matte paintings. What about when you have miniature water or fire, it's very extremely apparent even to the least sophisticated audience.

        Big VFX houses choose and pick between different alternatives. Now you can have matte paintings that combiene live action elements and have better camera moves. No strobing in CG characaters. You can film now big fire elements and composite them on miniatures or simulate water on the big scale. The list goes one.
      • Terminator 2's reflective surface morphing? Lost its shine a bit, hasn't it?

        .. say .. that's a nice post

        (*impale*)

        get out

        (*shove*)

      • I agree with the fact that models date less quickly. Also the guy saying they can do more with CG than models doesn't know the state of animatronics today. The best part of models is that they have real texture and their presence on film (or DV whatever) during the actual scene makes a tremendous impact on actors, lighting and overall atmosphere. CG does date quickly and there is a lot of bad / cheap CG out there. That's not to say CG doesn't have it's place, scenes like the ones in the upcomming AotC would be impossible without CG and on a large scale it can look very real, but detailed characters up close almost always look superimposed. I can't speak for AotC though and I hear the CG is spectacular so my tune may change. So it goes ;-)
    • I'm no luddite either, but I'm still someone who thinks that if you use CG, it should be done well.

      Good CG: Monsters, Inc
      Bad CG: Armageddon
      Good CG: Jurrasic Park 1
      Bad CG: Jurrasic Park 2

      The Special Effects in Star Wars: Episode 4 were a lot better and more realistic than Episode 1.

      Computer Graphics are good if used well. But without a good artistic eye for reality (or cartoon reality, depending on what you're aiming for with the movie) it's going to look lame.

      Heck, Who Framed Roger Rabbit had better special effects than Episode 1.
  • ...let's see...

    Mechanical webshooters versus organic...
    Green Goblin costume versus Green Goblin armor...
    No CGI versus CGI...

    ...I think 1992 looks like a better movie, actually. I mean, it sounds so much more in-tune with the comic books.

    Sadly, I work off of dial-up, so I can't download it...damn hillbilly town.

    If anyone wants to say how it is, drop me a line.

  • server errors already - read here: (Score:4, Informative)

    by thanjee ( 263266 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @11:38AM (#3457492) Journal
    Tobey Maguire Got the Big Bucks, but Dan Poole Got to Spider-Man First

    By Maurice Martin

    Unless you've spent the last six months in an al Qaeda cave, you already know that the first blockbuster film of the blockbuster season is Spider-Man, opening May 3. This comic-book adaptation features Tobey Maguire as Peter Parker, the high-school geek who gains superpowers from a radioactive spider bite, and Willem Dafoe as the villainous Green Goblin. The trailers promise an over-the-top super-slugfest, the two foes wielding fantastic weapons thanks to computer-generated special effects. Rumor says Sony Pictures dropped nearly $140 million on the film before marketing, but it's practically money in the bank: Spider-Man has a fanatical, worldwide fan base.

    One Baltimore Spider-fan is not impressed, though. "There's no excuse for that stupid raised webbing--it looks like cake frosting," Dan Poole says, referring to a detail of Maguire's costume that departs from the comic-book version. And don't get him started on those "organic web shooters"--another departure made by Spider-Man director Sam Raimi. In the comic, Spidey shoots webs from two mechanical devices of his own invention. In the movie, webs come out of his body. "It makes me want to hang somebody," Poole says.

    Poole isn't alone--Spider-Man fans tend to be purists. At www.no-organic-webshooters.com, more than 5,500 fans signed an online petition trying to get Raimi to stick more closely to the comic. But Poole speaks with authority--he's not only a fan, he made his own Spider-Man movie.

    In 1992, Poole played Spider-Man in The Green Goblin's Last Stand, a 50-minute video that he also wrote, produced, and directed. He even did his own stunts. For one eye-popping shot, he and his cameraperson trespassed on an abandoned high-rise at the corner of Calvert and Water streets, where Poole swung on a rope four stories off the ground, Spider-style, with no net to catch him if he fell. Poole shot his movie in and around Baltimore, using local performers and tapping friends and relatives for help with costumes, equipment, and camera-work. He estimates his total cash expenditure at less than $400.

    Bad dialogue, pre-CGI special effects, and irregular production values clearly mark GGLS as an amateur effort. But the stunts make it a must-see--Poole swings, leaps along high building ledges, rides atop a speeding car, and throws himself into every sort of obstacle. GGLS also benefits from a classic plot borrowed from two 1973 issues of Amazing Spider-Man. These featured the murder of Spidey's girlfriend, Gwen Stacy, at the hands of the Green Goblin--an unusually serious topic for a mainstream comic.

    Poole's adventures have earned him the respect of two communities: Spider-Man fans and independent moviemakers. The former made GGLS an underground classic. The latter honored him with two awards at this year's Nodance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, which is dedicated to first-time and digital filmmakers. In addition, Poole has been interviewed for the Independent Film Channel, FilmThreat.com and Inside magazine.

    Poole, 33, loves to bust on the new movie, though he's yet to see it (he bases his comments on stills, trailers, and interviews). But GGLS actually owes its existence to it--or, more specifically, to the new film's extraordinarily long development time. Because of legal issues surrounding the film rights to the title character, Spider-Man has been in development for more than 15 years. During the early 1990s, Terminator director James Cameron took on the project. When Poole heard this, he became obsessed with doing something to capture Cameron's attention and land himself a role in the film. GGLS was that something.

    To Poole's disappointment, Cameron's production company refused to screen GGLS. (Cameron eventually left the Spider-Man project.) However, others did watch it. Poole made copies and distributed them to friends and to a magazine called Hero Illustrated. People started to make copies of his copies, and GGLS spread dub-by-dub among Spider-lovers throughout the '90s.

    Chris Mason, Los Angeles-based co-founder of the fan site www.spidermanhype.com (now a part of www.superherohype.com), says his readers "have nothing but good things to say [about GGLS]. People are impressed by how insane Dan is. I mean, you can see him hanging by a rope from the side of a building. You know he's busting his balls to make a really cool Spider-Man."

    In September 2000, in response to fan interest, Poole converted GGLS to streaming video and posted it on the Web at www.localorigination.com. In December 2000, when the number of GGLS downloads reached 100,000, Poole decided to make a documentary called The Real Spider-Man: The Making of The Green Goblin's Last Stand. By the time he finished it around April 2001, 1 million viewers had downloaded GGLS.

    Marvel comics owns the characters, so Poole can't legally sell copies of GGLS. But he can sell a documentary about his own moviemaking efforts. Given the volume of questions about GGLS that have come his way, he hopes that the documentary will finally earn him some money. So far, the video version hasn't sold well. But in April, Poole released the DVD version of The Real Spider-Man, which includes GGLS as a free bonus track. He's hoping this will bump up sales.

    The Real Spider-Man won the Best Documentary award from the Nodance Festival this January. "It's a real crowd pleaser," says Jim Boyd, Nodance founder and festival director. "It's got a vibe everybody can get behind--small film does good." Poole picked up a second Nodance award for Guerrilla Marketing, which he earned by trudging through the Park City snow in a Spider-Man vest, putting up posters for his movie.

    People always remember the stunts in GGLS, and The Real Spider-Man shows just how much pain went into them, literally. Outtakes reveal Poole falling on his back and his head. He drops from the rafters of a warehouse onto a small stack of mats. He launches himself into a stack of barrels again and again and again. Like every moviemaker, Poole obsesses over getting the perfect shot. Unlike most moviemakers, he courts spinal trauma to get it. When a flip or a landing goes bad, you can hear Poole howl and curse--either from pain or artistic frustration. Or both.

    The documentary also introduces some of the people who helped Poole make his movie, including friends from his home neighborhood of Hamilton and former classmates from Parkville Senior High. Eric Supensky created the Goblin mask, its hideously exaggerated, malevolent grin a faithful interpretation of the comic. Matt Holder helped with the script and later did some of the Goblin stunts. Poole's cousin Ray Schueler did a little of everything, including MacGyver-like repairs when equipment failed. Poole's mother made one of the Spider-Man costumes (though she doesn't appear in The Real Spider-Man). And he did look outside the 'hood for acting talent, casting local stage regular Jimi Kinstle as the Green Goblin and Allison Adams, at the time a Towson University student, as Gwen Stacy. (Poole says Adams was the first blond he talked to about the part who took it and the film seriously.)

    Poole gives credit to his troops but claims the vision as his own. He's got strong opinions about how Spider-Man should look onscreen.

    "Four colors drive the reader's eye in comic books," Poole says. In his mind, Raimi's film fails to retain that look. "Everything is just so shadowed," he says. "Spidey's face looks creepy. It's like bizarro-world Spider-Man."

    GGLS has its faults, but Poole's battle royal between the red-and-blue hero and the green-and-purple villain is reverential to its source material. Berserk over Gwen's murder, Spidey gives the Goblin a savage beating. For this scene, Poole wore a torn Spidey mask. With one eye exposed, he looks like a flailing, demented cyclops. Behind the Goblin mask, you can see Kinstle's face awash in blood as he goads Spider-Man toward ultimate vengeance. Can Spider-Man kill? If he does, is he still a hero? The comic challenged readers with this question, and so does GGLS.

    Ten years after finishing his movie, Poole contemplates some of the props that have been stored in his mother's garage for a decade. He holds up Spidey's shirt, its reds and blues still vibrant. He tries on Spidey's belt. "It still fits," he says. "It's just a little tighter."

    Poole now works as a freelance videographer, editor, and producer. He sells The Real Spider-Man through his company's Web site, www.alphadogproductions.net. He's also working on a movie script with all-original characters--something with a superhero theme.

    And he's still got the daredevil spirit. With no prompting, he climbs aboard the Goblin's flying machine as though preparing for another stunt. Another friend, Don Koch, built it to Poole's specifications using the comic as reference. It consists of a simple tube, two wings, and, when complete, a bat-shaped face. Even with a decade of grime, it retains its iconic power, like a childhood memory made real.

    By contrast, the Goblin flier in the new movie is a complex, multijointed thing bristling with mysterious machinery. It looks so high-tech that Wired highlighted it in the magazine's May 2002 issue. Still, Poole will have none of it. Pointing to his flier, he says, "Don did what nobody in Hollywood will do. They're not capable of just doing this. They've got to put spikes and shit on it."

    Could his harsh opinion of the film be a case of sour grapes? "I would get behind them if I thought it was good. Believe me," Poole says. "I would be bitter either way that I wasn't part of it, but I don't want it to suck." But, sight unseen, he contends the Hollywood version lacks the integrity true Spidey fans want to see on the big screen.

    "It's all CGI," he laments. "It's got no heart."

    • I'd buy Poole's argument if the new Spidy had been directed by anyone else. Who but Raimi has the street cred to pull this off CGI and all? I think Sam paid his dues with live action fx. If Poole had taken Raimi's path and worked his way through movie after movie, I'm sure he'd kill to use this big budget to make Spider-Man EXACTLY how he envisioned him - using CGI. Maybe if Poole shared Raimi's unwavering love of film instead of Spider-Man, we'd be seeing more of this obviously talented man.
      • I agree with that. Raimi is a draw all by himself. Most of my favorite movies were directed by him, often with his brother in them. Let's not forget the Evil Dead series, Hercules and Xena. There have also been some flops, like Cleopatra 2525, and that awful Jack-somethingorother tv show.

        He's a guy who has paid his dues, and constantly relies on tough actors, models, and whatever tech is available. Evil Dead 1/2/3 had no CGI at all. Hercules and Xena did, most of it awful :)

        Raimi's a director who seems to always have tounge firmly in cheek while still trying to make good entertainment. Lucas used to be like that, 30 some years ago.

        I look forward to seeing a spiderman movie that has a really geeky (non-musclebound!) Peter Parker, a good selection of random effects that I can laugh at later, and some really cheesy dialog.

        Sheesh. Just remember that Spiderman is really a very silly concept. Who the heck heard of a radioactive spider giving you special powers? Have you people actually read the lousy dialog? Spiderman is for kids. It shouldn't be taken seriously, and I hope that Raimi won't.

        -WS

  • Works fine with MPlayer too (Score:5, Informative)

    by OblongPlatypus ( 233746 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @11:38AM (#3457493)
    "Green Goblin's Last Stand" works just fine with MPlayer [mplayerhq.hu], provided you download the .asf file from its actual URL [localorigination.com] first.
    • "Green Goblin's Last Stand" works just fine with MPlayer, provided you download the .asf file from its actual URL first.

      Sadly, the bandwidth is so hogged, that the download is going ar dialup speeds, even on a decent DSL line (3.5kb! Doh! it just dropped to 2.2kb)

  • Staying true to original? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by thaigan ( 197773 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @11:39AM (#3457495)
    I'm sure many will disagree, but I don't mind when movie directors change small things about a character like Spiderman if it adds to the story. In the article written by the submitter, the guy who made the original movie complains that Spiderman2002 will shoot webs from his own mutated body rather than contraptions made by Parker's own engineering. Personally, I prefer that as it makes him able to sling webs anytime(not just when he's suited up) and it doesn't require as much an explanation. If they made this movie with him inventing a web-slinging device, we'd all be arguing about the feasability this weekend!

    Just my opinion.
    • If they made this movie with him inventing a web-slinging device, we'd all be arguing about the feasability this weekend!
      And we wouldn't be arguing about the feasability of a guy mutated by a radioactive spider?
    • I totally agree. Even as a kid, I thought that the mechanical web device thing was retarded. I always thought, if a spider bit him and made it so he could climb walls and have spider sense, then why does he have to invent a web thing? Wouldn't that just be part of the overall spider package?

      I much prefer the new films handling of it (even though I haven't seen it yet).

      • Re:Staying true to original? (Score:3, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Wouldn't that just be part of the overall spider package?

        I agree, but shouldn't it also come out his ass instead of his wrists?
      • Crap! Ignorance like this pisses me off so much! If you don't understand fictional mutation theory any better than that then just stick with that Quantum nonsense before I go back in time and blast you with LASERs from my eyes! OKAY?
    • Bah, comic books have a long and cherished tradition of characters inventing completely implausible things. If it's hard to swallow someone inventing a web-slinging device, it's just as hard to swallow a web-slinging mutation (possibly harder than the traditional Spidey set of features.. e.g. super-strength and danger-sense are pretty run-of-the-mill). It doesn't particuarly "add to the story" or make the tradition any easier for an unfamiliar movie-goer to swallow.

      What it might do, though, is to save the time and attention-span of (even briefly) showing the origin of the device to the audience, which given the length of a movie, is a reasonable tradeoff. It's probably much faster to roll in the web-shooting exposition with the initial showing-off of the other Spidey-features... Whatever that scene may be; I haven't even seen a trailer so I'm commenting in blissful ignorance.

      • Yeah, but the webslinging mutation gets to piggyback on all of the other things that the spider bite does. This way, all of spidey's characteristics require a single plothole rather than multiple plotholes. You don't need to ask the audience to suspend their disbelief again.
    • When Spidey had the alien symbiote (sp?), he didn't need the mechanical web-shooters.

      The costume just shot out a little bit of itself and grew back the rest really quickly.

      So there is precedent for the organic webshooter.
    • What sets up the suspend-disbelief-by-the-neck-until-dead isn't one more amazing invention -- it's the question of how the guy who invented something the CEO of 3M would kill for could still have $$$ problems.
    • Wellll...
      ok, so the movie doesn't show the device

      Why isn't Spidey shooting webs from his mouth [or 'other']?
    • Umm...

      Ok, you do know that Spiderman often wore his Web shooters under his street clothes (and also often the whole costume except the mask.)

      The "organic Web shooters" thing is implausable too. How come the Web shooters are conveniently located in his wrists? In those Spider-Goats they created [slashdot.org], the spider silk protein is only produced by their genetically engineered mammary glands when they lactate. (Note, they are female spider-goats.) I mean this is a still the story of a young photographer who gets bitten by a radioactive spider, right? It isn't even remotely plausable that he would get "spider powers" from that. So, why are we worrying about "plausibility?"

      So, if it doesn't bother me that it isn't plausible, why does it bother me? Because it was pretty cool that Parker could come up with cool technology when he needed to. [spiderfan.org] What about the spider tracers that he could track via his spider sense? How are they going to explain those? More convenient organic tech? Raimi has boxed himself into a version of Spider-Man that has to become more and more divergent from canon. [dictionary.com]

      Now, despite my disappointment with certain details of the plot, I'm not saying it is a bad movie. Sam Raimi has done pretty well with other stories. It'll be "his" Spider Man (as opposed to "the" Spider Man), but I worry that the evil suits had some influence on the film. I won't see it, of course, until one of my friends or family inevitably rents it (or worse, buys it). MPAA bad, Sony bad, after all.

    • But giving him organic webshooters emphasises the "Spider" over the "Man". Peter Parker is supposed to be a genius, _before_ he got his powers. So, if it weren't for his intellect in the first place, he would have no webbing, losing much of what is Spider-Man in the first place.

      In Raimi's version, any schmuck could have been bitten by the spider, gotten built-in webs, and be Spider-Man. He lost sight of what made Peter Parker special.

    • Re:Staying true to original? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Corvus9 ( 300802 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @12:55PM (#3457981)
      I'm sure many will disagree, but I don't mind when movie directors change small things about a character like Spiderman if it adds to the story
      I'm one of those people who disagree. Not because they're changing the comic book, but because it totally changes the character.

      Spider-man was written during the 60s; when teenagers interested in technology were even greater social outcasts than they are now; technology was associated with the Vietnam war, ROTC, and the military-industrial complex. The "cool kids" were all dropping acid and communing with nature.

      Peter Parker was the first anti-establishment teenage super hero. Superman and the Fantastic Four were as straight as could be. Batman was an adult vigilante. But Spider-man was a groovy nerd; many early issues had him inventing chemical and electronic gadgets to solve crimes.

      The movie spider-man is none of these; he's now a teenage heartthrob. Since all his powers are biological, he doesn't need to have any technical knowledge at all. Just get into one-ness with your inner spider, and Nature will rescue you. See, the 60s acid-heads were right all along! That is why I hate the biolgical web-shooters.

      As for all the posters who will say "but how can a teenager invent what 3M can't"; because he's a technical genius, that's why! This is one of the most important themes from the comic book; that intelligence can be used to make things that help humanity instead of things like napalm.

      It looks like the Green Goblin still has his hoverjet and gas bombs, gee I wonder why 3M isn't trying to get its hands on those. Let me guess why... because only villians use technology now.

  • in the new film the webbing is supposed to come from his wrists.

    if he's like a spider, isn't the webbing supposed to come out his poop shoot?

    so..can he poop from his wrists too?

  • spidey (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Jacer ( 574383 )
    i won tickets to see spidey on wednesday at the premier in des moines thanks to lazer 103.3!! having seen both movies, i really liked the new one a lot more. spending half of the movie on charecter development gave me a much better feel for who peter parker was, not just how much ass spidey can kick.....being a comic fan-boy, i really like peter parker's persona, and don't forget, spidey kicks ass!
  • either way... just saw the movie... still make me dizzy...
  • At this very moment, Microsoft's legal team is preparing a lawsuit seeking to enjoin further showings of either film because they claim that the hero's facilitiy with spinning silk webs infringes on Microsoft's trademark of ".Net"

    Steve Ballmer's supporting affidavit reads, in part: "Web, net. Same thing. Please see $100,000 in cash, attached hereto as Exhibit 1."
  • Spider-Man 2002 vs. Spider-man 1992?? They can't compare to the sheer coolness of Spider-man 2099. I'd love to see a movie based on THAT series.
    • and he shot webbing without any mechanical devices either... I liked his dark sense of humor... now I have to break out that series again...
    • hell no. i loved spider-man, and i loved some of the 2099 titles (punisher 2099 was great.) but spider-man 2099 sucked hard.
      • hell no. i loved spider-man, and i loved some of the 2099 titles (punisher 2099 was great.) but spider-man 2099 sucked hard.

        The first 10 or so issue Doom 2099 (don't know how far it got) was the best comic I had read in years. I had a letter published, in issue #15, I think. The one with this [2099comics.com] cover.

        In any case, I dig spiderman, and don't mind his organic webshooters in 2099 or today.
        • i've heard that doom 2099 was good. but given that i was too young to have a job at that point, i had a very limited comics budget. it's only recently that i've been getting back into comics and even then it's mostly slave labor graphics stuff and other comics on the "alternative" rack.

  • Please (Score:4, Insightful)

    by First_In_Hell ( 549585 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @11:49AM (#3457549) Homepage
    Anyone looking to complain about the quality of the CG Spiderman is just looking to be a cynic. Lets be honest here, has anyone seen the television show from the 1970s, is that closer to reality for you?

    Sure, you can always tell what is CG and what is not, but this movie has been what I have been dreaming of since I was a kid, I'll take a little "fakeness" to the CGI if it remains true to the comic . . . Spiderman doing crazy ass stuff swinging all around the city. You just can't do Spiderman without some insane special effects without being true to the comic, it will just come off looking like the mess that was the TV show.

    I haven't seen the movie yet, but from the previews it looks like they have done an amazing job with the portrayal of Spiderman. This movie is going to be HUGE.

    • Lets be honest here, has anyone seen the television show from the 1970s, is that closer to reality for you?

      I saw the show when I was a little kid, so I don't remember it very well. But a couple of years ago, I found the pilot VHS tape on a video rental store, and I bought it for about 3 bucks or so (guess people weren't renting it at all :).

      So I gladly called some friends to watch it and have some laughs. That movie was so bad that it was kind of funny. And I'm not talking about CG (or lack of) only. Even the plot sucked (there is a scene when Spidey destroy the antenna that was causing the ninjas to be bad, and then he hug them and says they are good again - or something like it).

      Anyway, I'll probably watch it again after I see the new movie...
    • Wait until you see it. I got my first Spidey comic when I was about 6 (27 years ago), and have been a fan my whole life. Going into the movie, I was sure there was no way it could live up to my hopes/expectations. I was bummed about the whole organic webshooters versus mechanical.

      I watched the movie this afternoon. I had some little nits to pick here and there, but overall as a whole, the movie was way better than I expected.

      They did so many things right. The bit with "the burglar that changed his life" was done perfectly, and that's what I most expected them to do poorly. That whole section of the movie, as he was figuring out who he was and what he could do, was very well done. There were some scenes you could tell were computer-generated, but the for the most part, the excitement of the movie made it easier to tolerate. And the movie would have been worse without those scenes, or if they had tried to do them physically with stuntmen.

      The main characterization I felt was missing was that it would have been nice to have seen more background of the relation between Spidey and his Uncle Ben. Although I guess even in the original comics, we never really got that (although we heard about it plenty over the years).

      Anyway, I loved it. I can't wait for the DVD. I'll probably bring my dad to watch it this weekend, since he used to be a bit of a Spidey fan too.
  • I think that mainstream renditions have a great potential to suck people into the real thing. How many people got into anime because they adored the (now much-maligned) robotech cartoon from the '80s?

    On one hand, I side with the purists. But they have to admit that exposure like this swells their ranks. And, in this case, it likely makes the creators boatloads of moneys, which also indirectly benefits them.

  • At least (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Brandeissansoo ( 553129 )
    The new version has enough light to see the charaters, and enough sound quality to hear them talk.

  • Sour grapes ... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by zangdesign ( 462534 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @11:52AM (#3457572) Journal
    Dan Poole comes across as having a bad case of sour grapes. Sure, it's great to see some guy hanging it all out there one the edge, risking his life, etc., but it doesn't necessarily make for a better movie. There are other factors involved such as story, acting, etc.

    Since Poole makes his comments without having seen the newest version, I tend to disqualify his commentary as having any validity.
  • Spidey had a short-lived live-action series [imdb.com] in the 1970's. Overall it tunk, but it had its points. In the series his spider-sense was more developed: he could actually envision the bad goings on (which he saw in a cheesy but somehow effective negative camera image). Sometimes the shots of him on the ceiling actually looked quite realistic. However, most of the shots of him wall-crawling were horrible: you could plainly see that they put a wall prop on the floor and he attempted to crawl across it on his fingers and toes. The weight distribution clearly looked wrong to the eye. It also suffered from the mask thing [imdb.com]: when you put a mask on an actor, the actor has to hold his/her head all weird to see. This was clearly apparent in the series. I'm happy to notice that it doesn't appear in the movie trailers.

    But hey, I was a fifth grader. I caught every episode.

  • You know, we have to put this stuff in perspective. They're doing movies based upon comic books. The way I see it, there are two options: make something that doesn't make much sense which won't sell as well (like Dick Tracy), or completely alter the mood and how everything works (like TMNT, Incredible Hulk, Batman) to suit the time and place.

    Comic books are rather like books: they can be timeless. Movies have a much harder time with that because your imagination can't fill in details that make the characters seem to fit in your present time - things like how they walk, what their clothing would look like if they where real, how they sound, etc.

    Have you seen any spidey movies from the seventies? They are...VERY 70's. You almost expect Shaft to bust in and help Spidey out with the bad guys.

    One final note: Organic web shooters? Raimi's on crack. Spiderman was Marvel's answer to Batman: a character who used his mind to figure out how to defeat his enemies. Nowhere is there a better reminder of that than in the fact that the webshooters where an invention.

    Plus, I could totally see that going awry: Peter gets all hot 'n bothered by MJ, and, completely distracted, he shoots webbing all over the place, random-like. Of course, I've always thought that Wolverine would have similar problems with his lovers, except instead of accidentally getting everything sticky, he'd probably destroy everything. Comics creators and movie directors just don't think much about those kinds of things...
    • Plus, I could totally see that going awry: Peter gets all hot 'n bothered by MJ, and, completely distracted, he shoots webbing all over the place, random-like. Of course, I've always thought that Wolverine would have similar problems with his lovers, except instead of accidentally getting everything sticky, he'd probably destroy everything.

      Uh, why would some nerdy geek need the ability to shoot webbing to accidently get everything sticky when getting it on with a chick like Mary Jane?

      I suspect that happens to most Slashdotters now...

    • Peter gets all hot 'n bothered by MJ, and, completely distracted, he shoots webbing all over the place, random-like.

      Kind of like Amereican Pie?
    • Plus, I could totally see that going awry: Peter gets all hot 'n bothered by MJ, and, completely distracted, he shoots webbing all over the place, random-like... Comics creators and movie directors just don't think much about those kinds of things...

      Correction: nice comics creators don't think much about those kinds of things. Pat Mills & Kev O'Neill's fine book "Crime & Punishment: Marshal Law Takes Manhattan," OTOH, includes exactly what you're after:
      Case 5: A shy and sexually inhibited young man, who was experiencing difficulties with his marriage and coping with his super powers, he was diagnosed as suffering from a psycho-sexual neurosis.

      He tried to overcome his marital problems by a blatant form of exhibitionism. Namely: spending his nights leaping from building to building in a hairy spider suit, "web-shooting".

      The sexual significance of this, along with the circumstances under which he was arrested, is discussed below...
  • I notice all too frequently that when a movie comes out that has had prior releases in some other form that there is a resurgence of these materials on the DVD rack at the video store.

    Seems to me like this guy wants his $400 back + some in 2002.
  • I was watching clips on the new last night and they showed Spiderman in a fight w/a bunch of bad guys.

    The way he moved did not correlate to reality in the least. It was just really off. I think they were shooting to have him move like a spider- but I've got to be honest I wish they had not got him moving so fast.

    I'm sure I'll like the film - I'm not super picky about movies. But it was interesting watching that fight and knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that the spiderman character was completely computer generated. No person could move like that.

    They should of dressed up a martial arts guy and made it look like he had some mass and the laws of gravity etc. were still in effect.

    .
  • ... you've gotta agree that you can't beat the original version of the theme song ;-)

  • Old School (Score:2, Funny)

    by loteck ( 533317 )

    For those of you are hardcore non-cgi Spidey fans, there is always the 2 part movie [amazon.com] from 1977 starring Nicholas Hammond. Check out this pic [amazon.com] of the movie's cover art.

    Yeah. Nice to see how far we've come in movies since then ;)

  • You have to be realistic (Score:5, Insightful)

    by EulerX07 ( 314098 ) on Friday May 03, 2002 @12:01PM (#3457627)
    Mr Poole is evidently a die-hard fan of the spiderman comic books. But he must realize that if a commercial movie was made to be 100% faithful to the comic books it would probably fail and only appeal to those few die-hards. Marvel comic books written in the 50's,60's and 70's are all tainted with issues and a view of the world of those years. It was just after the discovery of atomic powers, so half of the super-heroes just needed to have some contact with radiation to get super powers. Now most people know that if they did get in contact with radiation they'd get super-burns or super-cancer, not super-powers.

    Today's world preoccupations have changed, and if you want those old stories to have an effect on people you need to adapt them to the present. This is something that Mr Raimi understands but Mr Poole seems oblivious to. X-men would have been a huge flop if they had spandex costumes and just took a plot line straight from the comic books with no adaptation.

    So in the end you should just respect the artistical and technical choice of the film makers and try to enjoy the movie. It's not like they re-wrote the holy bible...
    • Ermm...Actually, if you want a more modern, yet close to the actual story, version of Spider-Man, check out Marvel's Ultimate Spider-Man comic. It's essentially retelling Spider-Man's origins. You can see where it was written to go along better with the movie, or vice versa, but over all, its really good.
    • Gotta agree with you. Tim Burton's "Batman" (the first movie) was a very good adaptation of the character. We as fans must remember that Hollywood is full of people who want their OWN adaptations of things, and it is improbable and unlikely for EVERY SINGLE COMIC BOOK element to be present in an adaptation.

      The few things that are different (the organic stuff) are small. The heart of Spidey is here, and a damned sight better than the TV show (believe me--I watched it first-run). I definitely agree on your comment about "X-Men." People aren't going to buy the use of the costumes of the comic books because they were too campy. Some costumes, like Superman's and Batman's, weren't changed that much from their comic book versions (which have changed a lot over the years, too). Spidey's costume is quite acceptable.

      People have complained about how Spidey moves. For cryin' out loud--he's now a MUTANT. How slow do you think Spidey has to be so he won't get shot? In a comic book, you don't have a perception of speed but your own. This movie has Raimi's, and again, it's acceptable enough.

      And to add on to this thread's note: Don't spend your money and you won't need to complain. The comic will live, with all its fanboys and its canon. Not even the WB animated series of heroes is perfect or canon, but it is enjoyable, and that is what it's all about.

  • I don't remember... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 03, 2002 @12:17PM (#3457715)
    ...do we hate the MPAA this week or not? Or are we taking the whole summer off? Please advise.
    • Don't feel guilty about giving MPAA money, just make sure to steal an extra 2 or 3 albums from the RIAA to make up for it.

      3 CD's x $18 = $54 - $10 movie ticket = $45 they didn't get from you. That way you can still see the flick AND stick it to the man. Fight the power!

  • Never happened before, huh?

    Anyway, the article doesn't focus on the CG/non-CG aspects of it. It's more of an interview with a guy who made an, apparently, good and popular live action movie ten years ago.

    It's not that he wouldn't support a good CG movie, it just that he doesn't think this movie will be all that good. It deviates from the standards set in the comic book. It focuses more on Poole as a purist, and someone who really honors and respects Spider-Man's long and impressive history.

    As we've seen, however, this means nothing. Lots of superhero movies and TV shows go against their comic's grain. Superman was a much more serious comic (in the past 10-20 years) than the good-for-a-season Lois and Clark. X-Men didn't stick true to everything in the comic, but it was still a good movie, with memorable lines like "What else would we wear? Yellow spandex?" (Wolverine).

    In fact, some of the better movies and series don't succeed. Same goes for comics. I, personally, thought that the Flash TV series was very good. It didn't deal with many very serious issues, but it was a dark and serious show, in many cases darker than the comic.

    When you translate something from the little pages to the big screen, you have to expcet things to get changed or cut. It sucks that they do it, but they often don't have the time/resources/etc.. I don't like that they do it either. It doen't mean we can't enjoy the new story though.

    Think about Lord of the Rings. Honestly, it was an amazing film (and Oscar Nominee), but a lot was left out from the books. Some of the things in were changed. Like, say, 17 years that instead take, what, a few weeks, months maybe in the movie? It doesn't hurt to hear what someone else thinks of a story.

    Before any of you read the story, how many knew that Spidey, in the comic, made the web-shooters, and that they weren't standard with the spiderbite? I'd guess that it was about even. The only reason I knew is because they mentioned it in the old Spider-Man cartoon show.

    Anyway, I'm done.

    The_Shadows[LTH], out.
  • This is a perfect example of fan fiction, and what lucas is trying to stop (regarding starwars).

    He has that contest that was noted on slashdot a day or two ago, where he is only allowing paradies or something like that. And everybody on slashdot was getting bent out of shape over lucas preventing proper fan fiction.

    Well the fact of the matter is we don't need his permission to do fan fiction. He can control the contest, but if I want to write a story about starwars characters, and taking place in the starwars universe, nobody can stop me. It's called a "derivative" work.

    Actually selling it gets on shady ground legally, but I am pretty sure it isn't illegal in all cases.

    Slashdot has a enough jon katz bozo's walking around... it'd be nice if we had some actual lawyers wandering around slashdot--although I suppose their sigs would be some horribly long disclaimer.

    --Scott
    • There are a gazillion Star Wars fan fiction films going around, and they haven't been shut down by Lucasfilm. Just go the theforce.net for some of them.

      I think Lucas only had a problem with the so called "Phantom Edit" and I can understand why he wouldn't like people editing his film in such a manner.
  • I think you guys are going to be pleasantly surprised. The CGI is about the only fault I could find with the movie. It explores morals in a much more interesting way than any comic book movie I can remember, except perhaps Batman.

    I really liked it. I may not be a die-hard Spidey fan, but I thought the film was intelligent and well done.

    My $.02.
  • Way back when the Hulk was on prime-time TV (Bill Bixby), Captain America was a failing live action saturday afternoon sitcom, and we all wondered who the hell The Greatest American Hero was supposed to be.

    Of course, none of these featured Kirstun Dunst's pert nipples.
  • Rotten Tomato [rottentomato.com] has Spiderman cleaning up good reviews. [rottentomatoes.com]

  • "haven't seen it but it sux."
  • why do people keep talking about Perl in the movies? I knew it could do everything, but still...

    ;)
  • Ok guys, I'm gonna go out on a limb here. But first, I need you to set aside your preconceptions.

    Work with me here, because I'm suggesting that maybe Peter Parker doesn't have to caucasian. I myself am, and the comic book (and all the movies) have portrayed him as such. But the truth is, there is only one man capable of doing what Spiderman is capable of.

    Jackie Chan.

    Yes, that's right, Jackie Chan. So his accent is a little strong. Certainly they could afford some decent voice coaching. But other than that, what is wrong with him? That's right, nothing.

    What's right with him? A man who can run up walls, without CG effects. His reaction speed is simply incredible. Gymnastics. And he's not even a bad actor, he has that whole comedic side to him. Hell, I wouldn't be shocked, if during the credits they'd show him swinging from 100 story buildings and having bloopers.

    You could practically do away with the whole special effects budget.

    So tell me, what, other than prejudice and Hollywood's predisposition to heap stinky garbage on us, kept this from happening?
    • What's wrong with Jackie Chan? He's like, 50 years old or something. Not a convincing high-schooler in my opinion. I love Jackie Chan, but he's soooo not right for Spider-Man.
    • Ok, first off, I see your point: Jackie Chan could certainly kick ass as Spider-Man (though voice coaching would be required for it to make a mainstream version, the success of the Rush Hour films not withstanding).

      But for the love of God, don't you think the guy deserves a break? I mean, he's not as young as he used to be you know. I remember an interview with him a few years ago where he was saying that he really didn't want to keep doing all the stunts, but since that's what his career was built on he really couldn't stop.
  • Looking at the 1992 film, I can't help but notice how dumb, ugly, poorly acted and generally embarrassing it is. Faithful representation on $500? Yeah, and for this alone I applaud him. But I don't want to see a cheap faithful representation. Because back when the original script was written, comics had horrid color, no real depth and hackneyed stories. Much as I hate to say it, true believers, I vastly prefer the digitally coloured, dolled up Bendis/Bagley Ultimate Spiderman series that Marvel introduced back in 2000 to the silver age original. Just as I preferred the 1988 "Spiderman" series as drawn by the megalomaniacal Todd McFarlane to its precursors. I want to see "Ultimate Spiderman" on the screen, not "Peter Parker, My Dad's College Roommate." I want to see him face the pressures of modern life, not of stylzed 1950s existance.

    Which is why U.S. (the comic) is so great. Marvel's "Ultimates" series is a new "world" that reorigins some of their most popular characters --so that modern fans, like my twelve year old brother, don't have to buy and read through thousands of issues of backstory to get the low down on the characters and their relationships. They've made minor changes to the original stories as well as changed the pacing to more of a serialized "Dawson's Creek" soap opera with action and plot development. Updates such as making Peter Parker the DailyBugle.com's webmaster (and not a teenage photgrapher, which is silly) or making Thor a eco-warrior hippy are minor and do nothing to destroy the mood of characters. This is exactly what comics needs to draw in new readers -- a way to relate them to people of today, not a reminder of the silver age of rehashing pulp novels by dressing middleaged guys in spandex, giving them bad parted haircuts and calling them "teen-agers".

    The Spider-man movie is a natural extension of this idea -- bring readers to the comics that are most like the film, and from there move them into the "harder stuff." Hey, it worked for me -- Tim Burton's Batman sold me hard on Frank Miller's Dark Knight stuff and I've had a sub ever since.
  • Spider-man [imdb.com], the Animated Series.

    PS - If you really want to be True Believers, then the plot has to move slowly. [kingfeatures.com]

    At that glacier rate, the movie would take,.... um.... about 27 years.

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