The 8 SPIDER-MAN movies are playing in theaters nationwide this week. I’m not entirely clear on the reasons for why or why now, but it is surely a welcome occasion. The now-classic SPIDER-MAN 2 (2004) is back in theaters, just for today.
by Jon Abrams
On this day in superhero film history, June 30th, 2004, SPIDER-MAN 2 hit theaters. I was there that weekend. It was critical mass of my interests: Spider-Man, massive American pop blockbuster filmmaking, and movies directed by Sam Raimi. It’s also pretty much exactly as if somebody put a camera on me in my twenties.
It’s not possible to watch movies objectively and it’s not possible to write about them that way, but some movies make it harder than others. For me, SPIDER-MAN 2 is impossible to look at without thinking about myself, so I wouldn’t blame anyone for stopping reading right here. Outside of people directly related to me, I cannot expect anyone wants to read about my life. And even some of them might not want to stick around! You came to read about SPIDER-MAN 2, not Jon Abrams. Then again, there are nearly twenty years’ worth of articles about SPIDER-MAN 2 online, so as long as you’re here, why not read mine?
Stan Lee once said something about how anyone can relate to Spider-Man because unlike most superheroes in comic books up to him, he wore a full mask. Superman and Wonder Woman don’t wear masks at all. Batman wears a mask over half his face. Spider-Man, full face. He could be anybody under there. Peter Parker was always drawn to be a dorky but handsome white guy. I always secretly assumed, on account of the neurosis and guilt, that he had to be Jewish, but that was never part of the text, and so Spider-Man belongs to everyone. One thing that is great about Miles Morales and the SPIDER-VERSE characters is that they further democratize the character. Now we see conclusively that Spider-Man can be Afro-Latino or Indian or female or anything else. I’m all for it. I love that my niece can watch ACROSS THE SPIDER-VERSE and see, if not herself (yet), then at least a Spider-Man who looks like the boys she goes to school with. That said, the Spider-Man we see in the first three SPIDER-MAN movies is me.
I think it was somewhere in 1999, when THE CIDER HOUSE RULES came out, that it really started happening. “You look like the kid from THE CIDER HOUSE RULES.” Not all the observations were particularly creative. There are other celebrities I’ve been compared to, but Tobey Maguire by far most frequently. Not conventionally attractive maybe, not intimidating if you’re inclined to see the handsomeness, with a specific hairline, heavily-lidded, and most obviously to me, a lopsided smirk that is (I hope) charming and not obnoxious. I’m not sure who I’m describing here. Over the years, and nowadays, I more often hear Jake Gyllenhaal, who not for nothing, nearly replaced Tobey Maguire for SPIDER-MAN 2 and who played his brother in a movie called BROTHERS. He also ended up playing in the Spider-Man world playing Mysterio in FAR FROM HOME. I always say I’m more of a Funko Pop Jake Gyllenhaal. Shorter and rounder. I’ve been in the same room as Tobey Maguire, by the way. Shorter than him too. (Great!) Doesn’t matter. I still to this day get called out on the streets of New York: “Yo Spider-Man! Wanna listen to a mixtape?” I don’t, but I encourage your creativity. Never give up.
Photoshop by a friend, circa 200-something
It’s way more than the passing resemblance. SPIDER-MAN 2 feels to me like a Jon Abrams mockumentary in intensely personal ways. I did relate to SPIDER-MAN (2002), in that I had an Uncle Ben in my grandfather Sam who meant everything to me and who instilled in me a moral example that I still feel like I fail to live up to. I related to the high school scenes of SPIDER-MAN, which made the high school hallways feel like a series of pitfalls, obstacles, and dangers. Likewise, I related to the awkwardness of Peter Parker’s “dark” phase in SPIDER-MAN 3 (2007), although I fear my own dark phase went darker. (We’ll save it for the autobiography.) But it’s SPIDER-MAN 2 that most directly resembled my life. I had an Aunt May in my grandmother Eleanor, Grandpa Sam’s wife, who continued to guide me and serve as a source of warmth to return to, even after I lost Grandpa.
In my younger years I had a Mary Jane, a woman I pined away for, and I also had a handful of Felicia Hardys, because no analogy is perfect. I had a mentor figure in my mother’s cousin Matt, who almost literally said to me the words “Brilliant but lazy,” which Dr. Otto Octavius (Alfred Molina) says to Peter before realizing there was more to him than those three words. I like to think Matthew felt that way about me too. He continued to advise me and to check me when necessary, until his death a year and a week ago, and without him my life is lacking something essential. Outside of “Brilliant but lazy,” and the fact that he adored his own Rosie (Donna Murphy), there’s no point of comparison between him and Doc Ock. You’d only see it in those warm early scenes where Alfred Molina gets to be charming because Doc Ock’s demons overtake him.
But I’ve had plenty of J. Jonah Jamesons in my adult life, not all of them as scary as JK Simmons maybe, and I’ve got a sad handful of Harry Osborns, guys who I’ve estranged, alienated, lost, guys who may see me now as an enemy, guys to whom I wish I could explain that all I ever wanted was to be their friend. And there’s Peter Parker’s secret identity: I too have done many good things for other people in my life, selfless things, things I will never tell you about, even in an over-personalized essay like this one. I didn’t do any of those things to brag about them, and I won’t do it here, or ever. You do good things because that’s what’s right, not because anyone’s watching. That’s what I learned from Spider-Man, but more importantly, from my Grandpa Sam. I know I’ve messed up plenty along the way too. My many mistakes are my own, and you can be sure they haunt me.
No doubt these details aren’t unique to me. Maybe you related to some of these elements too. I figure many of you did: The movie made nearly $800 million worldwide and continues to be rediscovered by new fans. But there’s something to me so eerie about the fact that a movie with so many echoes of my own life would come out at the moment in time that I was living through. I’m not into shamanism, but I did get the sense in 2004, between this and COLLATERAL (“What the fuck are you still doing driving a cab?”) that the movies were trying to tell me something. I didn’t listen.
Before I get to that, let me make some note of the craft on display in SPIDER-MAN 2. It’s the most “Sam Raimi” of the great director’s three SPIDER-MAN movies, with a freaky, funny hospital scene straight out of his earlier EVIL DEAD work and probably the funniest Bruce Campbell performance of the three. As the years passed, I’ve seen his character as more evil than ever I did.
SPIDER-MAN 2is one of the best-looking action films of the decade, courtesy of one of my favorite working cinematographers, Bill Pope (who worked with Raimi before on DARKMAN and ARMY OF DARKNESS), and is expertly edited by fellow Raimi crew veteran Bob Murawski, who won an Academy Award at decade’s end (for THE HURT LOCKER. Fun asterisk for fans of me: One of the first film scripts I ever wrote that went nowhere had that title.)
The opening titles featured narrative art by Alex Ross, one of the most influential comic-book artists of the past thirty years. The score by Danny Elfman only expands on and improves upon his work from the first film. The “Spider-Man” theme is exactly right for the character, hero-sounding in the weirdest way possible.
As for the cast, it’s all expert, top to bottom. Poor Dylan Baker and Elizabeth Banks never did get the spotlight they deserved in this franchise, but at least Bill Nunn as Robbie got more to do in #2. J.K. Simmons was impeccable as always, even better casting for J. Jonah than Stan Lee himself could have been, as was Alfred Molina, as the anti-hero Otto Octavius, definitely the best “villain” in franchise history to date, maybe in superhero-movie history at that. And this is saying a lot, because there is no better supervillain casting than Willem Dafoe as Norman Osborn, unless you consider #3’s Thomas Haden Church as Sandman, which was as close as possible to Lee Marvin as Spider-Man villain. (No offense meant to Topher Grace, but “guy who just as easily could have played Spider-Man” isn’t my ideal casting notion for Eddie Brock. A guy like Tom Hardy makes more sense, although those VENOM movies… hm.) James Franco in retrospect is even better casting for Harry than he even was originally. I have great fondness for Rosemary Harris as Aunt May, since my grandma was such a huge fan of her stage work. Kirsten Dunst is an interesting choice for Mary Jane, who was more of an effervescent character in the comic books. Kirsten Dunst plays more to her sadness, which still works, and she absolutely nails one of the film’s most important lines. (More on that in a minute.)
Above all, Tobey Maguire as Peter Parker. As I said, there’s too much in the way for me to look at the part or even his performance as a separate thing from the life I lived. I do think that even without all of that, I would have appreciated that Sam Raimi and company cast a less conventional-looking guy as Peter. It’s like Michael Keaton as Batman: Counter-intuitive, but even more perfect as time goes on.
There have been two more Spider-Mans since Tobey Maguire: For two films there was Andrew Garfield, who I really liked. Quite frankly, he looks more like I would have pictured Peter Parker from the comic books. For six films now (that would be three AVENGERS movies and three solo SPIDER-MAN movies) we have had Tom Holland, who does youthful enthusiasm better than just about anyone. I like both these guys, but I still like Tobey Maguire best in the role, and not just because of all the resonance it has for me to see a guy who looks like me playing a part that is so similar to me, but also exactly because of that. I think at this point it’s no spoiler to mention that we get to see all three Spider-Men in 2021’s SPIDER-MAN: NO WAY HOME.
What’s most interesting about that movie, and I do think there are several, is Tobey Maguire. He’s pushing fifty now, as am I. There’s a bittersweet aspect in seeing an aging Spider-Man. It’s bittersweet maybe to see an aging Tobey Maguire. I don’t see aging as a sad thing for myself, since my grandpa Sam was an old guy, to me, and he was the coolest. But seeing Tobey in that movie was intriguing. NO WAY HOME couldn’t have been about him, business-wise, but that obviously to me was the thread I most wanted to see. This is the Peter from SPIDER-MAN 2, older now. Peter implies he is still with Mary Jane. He implies it’s not perfect. That’s life. It would be nice to imagine they are still together, that it worked out. I’d rather see that than just about any big superhero battle.
I keep trying to get back to talking about the movie, but I’m really talking about my own life. Towards the end of SPIDER-MAN 2, Mary Jane, having learned that Peter Parker is Spider-Man, feels ready to commit to a relationship and says to Peter, “Isn’t it about time somebody saved your life?” I’ve had someone say something like that to me, and I don’t think she was much of a superhero fan. She was saying that because she knew who I really am. In SPIDER-MAN 2, Peter hears Mary Jane says that, but then he hears a siren in the distance, and with her blessing, but not getting to see the melancholy on her face, he swings out the window to go be Spider-Man. I’ve done that. I have turned and left, when someone was standing there in my doorway. I don’t know why that is, exactly. 2007’s SPIDER-MAN 3, for all its flaws, ends on the most beautiful scene in all of superhero-movie history. It’s what you want for Mary Jane and for Peter. For me, it hasn’t ever been that perfect. To date, I’m still out there web-slinging on the solo. Isn’t it about time I let somebody save my life?
Stay tuned, true believers.
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Tags: Alfred Gough, Alfred Molina, Alvin Sargent, Bill Nunn, Bill Pope, Bob Murawski, Brent Briscoe, Bruce Campbell, Cliff Robertson, Daniel Gillies, Danny Elfman, Donna Murphy, Donnell Rawlings, Dylan Baker, Elizabeth Banks, J.K. Simmons, James Franco, John Landis, John Paxton, Jon Abrams, Joy Bryant, Kirsten Dunst, Marvel Comics, Michael Chabon, Miles Millar, New York City, Phil LaMarr, Rosemary Harris, Sam Raimi, scott spiegel, Sequels, Spider-Man, Stan Lee, Steve Ditko, Ted Raimi, Tobey Maguire, Vanessa Ferlito, Willem Dafoe
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