All 6 Spider-Man Films Ranked (2002-2017)
Here are my rankings for all 6 Spider-Man films. SPOILER ALERT
Spider-Man 2 (2004, Raimi) Spider-Man 2 remains one of the best superhero films to this day. For a long time it was looked at as a model for making other superhero films. In this film, Peter continues to struggle with the burden of being Spider-Man, his love for MJ, college and let’s not forget Doc Ock. This film is relatable because most of us can barely handle school and a social life on our own. Peter’s relatable personal struggle earns our sympathy but Doctor Octopus receives almost as much. With the death of his wife and his failed experiment we can see why Doc Ock does what he does and we really do feel for his character. On top of all that, the iconic train rescue makes this the ultimate Spider-Man film. A+
2. Spider-Man (2002, Raimi) The first live action Spider-Man movie is just plain classic. It was the first to portray Peter getting bitten by the spider, discovering his powers and the death of Uncle Ben. The iconic upside down kiss in the rain can’t be beat. The best part of Spider-Man is that he has to deal with everyday high school problems while balancing being a superhero on the side. This movie displays that masterfully. Also, the tension created by the dinner scene with Peter and Norman (the Green Goblin) was fantastic. This film may look somewhat clichéd now, but it certainly was original at the time and remains one of the better superhero origin stories. The score for this movies as well as the rest of the Raimi trilogy is phenomenal. A
3. Spider-Man Homecoming (2017, Watts) The most recent Spider-Man film is an absolute blast. It pays homage to many of the previous films, while managing to be just different enough. For example after Peter saves his classmates at the Washington monument, the suit tells Peter to kiss his crush, Liz while he is hanging upside down in front of her. He doesn’t, but this is clearly a nod to the iconic kiss from the 2002 film. Another great thing about Homecoming was how much it was tied in with the MCU, making the villain (the Vulture played buy Michael Keaton) create weapons left by aliens from the Avengers films. Homecoming also benefits from having a villain we understand and feel sympathy for. Michael Keaton certainly portrays one of the better villains in the MCU because we did understand where he was coming from. The twist in the middle of the film, when we find out that the Vulture is actually Liz’s father was also fantastic and made the film much better. The tension in this scene reminded me once again of the dinner scene from the first film. Overall Homecoming managed to tell an original story without giving us the details that we already knew so well. Telling the story of Peter growing up and maturing as a person instead of the typical Spider-Man origin story paid off brilliantly. Oh, and did I mention it’s absolutely hilarious? As far as I'm concerned this ranks very close to the 2002 film. A
4. Spider-Man 3 (2007, Raimi) I was in denial for a long time that this movie was as bad as it was, but it is. Yes the infamous dance scene was cheesy but my least favorite part of the film was the final fight with Venom. The fight just seemed too easy and Venom turned out not to be as great of a villain as I expected. However, there are definitely some redeeming qualities of this film. For example Peter’s struggle with identity has once again taken over his life and he must really choose who he wants to be (which seems to be theme throughout the Raimi trilogy). I also liked how they handled Harry Osborn (James Franco) in the beginning and the end of the film; I just wish he hadn’t been struggling with his memory for most of the film. Overall, Spider-Man 3 the clearly the worst of the Raimi trilogy but looking back, the worst Spider-Man film was yet to come. C
5. The Amazing Spider-Man (2012, Webb) Being of a big fan of Raimi’s films I was very excited to see a new take on my favorite web crawler, and I was extremely disappointed. My biggest problem with it is that it didn’t feel like Spider-Man. I loved the score and the feel of the previous films and all of that was gone. Beyond that, the villain, the Lizard, was not great. The origin story was just plain awful. They tried to add something different by making us wonder about Peter’s parents but the questions were barely answered and were teased for the next film. They also once again did a very similar origin story to the one that had been told just ten years before. They just did not do it nearly as well. D+
6. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014, Webb) this was one of the worst superhero films I have ever seen. I was excited at the thought of seeing some iconic Spider-Man villains like Electro and Rhino on the big screen for the first time. I was so bored throughout this movie I could not believe it. How could they have made a Spider-Man film with all these villains and make it so uninteresting? That was exactly the problem: there were too many villains. There was way too much going on which made it hard to focus (or really care) about anything in this film. Spider-Man 3 also suffered from this problem. The other big disappointment for me was they cast Paul Giamatti as Rhino and he is only in the last few minutes of the film. A total mess, the Amazing Spider-Man 2 not only buried Webb’s franchise for good but proved to Sony that they needed help from Marvel Studios. F
Sam Raimi’s Trilogy stars Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, James Franco, WIllam Dafoe, Alfred Molina, Topher Grace and Thomas Hayden Church
Webb’s films starred Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, James Kinsle, Jamie Foxx, Paul Giamatti and Rhys Ifans
Spider-Man Homecoming stars Tom Holland, Michael Keaton, Robert Downey Jr., Zendaya, Narisa Thome, Donald Glover and Jacob Bataion