#9 SPIDERMAN 2

This here is all about the second installment of the three Spiderman movies that are out. Personally out of all the movies this was my least favorite because it seems like everyone is just off their rocker and that they can’t keep their lives straight. This is especially true when considering Peter Parker himself. He is struggling really with his personal life Mary Jane Watson is engaged to someone else and Peter doesn’t know what to do about it. Spiderman is being attacked by the press and because of all that drama he isn’t doing so well is school and he can’t hold a job. In other words Peter Parker is gradually falling apart piece by piece. He’s losing faith in himself and so he lets Spiderman fall away and let those that believe in him think that he has just gone away.

Peter isn’t the only one whose life is falling apart though. Dr. Otto Octavius is giving a presentation to Harry Osborn when it all goes horribly wrong and the doctor’s wife is killed in the process and he becomes fused with mechanical tentacles that do what he makes them do. So another villain is born and like the others before him Doc Ock has a vendetta against Spiderman because what Harry Osborn wants more then anything in the whole world is revenge against the person he believes killed his father.

So Doc Ock and Harry make a deal. Harry agrees to give Octavius the last piece to the puzzle that he needs to complete the experiment that went wrong and Doc Ock will get Harry Spiderman. So ensues a fight and what not and Doc Ock takes down Spiderman and brings him to Harry and the exchange is made. Little known to Peter because he is unconscious when he is brought to Harry’s but he’s up when Harry removes his mask. It would be an understatement to say that Harry wasn’t a little more then upset by the fact that his best friend is Spiderman and that Peter in turn then is the one that killed Norman Osborn.

So that is really the major part of the storyline for this story. Like I said everyone’s life is really in the dog house with this movie and there isn’t a whole lot going on other then that. No one is really all that happy even Mary Jane that is engaged isn’t really happy and she knows it she just doesn’t know what to do about it. So the story goes on everyone just stumbling along trying to make ends meet and come out alive and well in the end.

I would have to say that out of all the super hero movies there are this is the least well done. I just wasn’t a big fan. The Spiderman movies aren’t my favorite to begin with but there was just so much drama and heart ache that it was almost too much to have in one movie. Don’t get me wrong it was well made and the sequences were put together well, it worked it really did I just didn’t like it as much as the other two or other movies like Batman and Iron Man.

Peter is forced to make a lot of tough choices and deal with the repercussions of those decisions all on his own. He feels misunderstood and doesn’t really know what to do other then give up this double life that he has been living. So he has a choice live a life of his own and lets those that believe in him down or be the hero that leads a life of chaos and terror. It is quite epic when you think of it in that sense and ask yourself what would I do if I were in his shoes.

On those notes then I say this. Spiderman is a good movie not one of my favorites but it is good all the same. There isn’t a whole lot of range with this movie because it is a lot of gloom and doom but they still hit the two main groups of viewers.

For men there is the action. From Doc Ock and his tentacles reaping havoc on the city trying to get what he wants. To Harry putting his two sense in there about wanting Spiderman to pay for what he did to Harry’s father. To Peter as Spiderman and his attempts to make the city a safe place to live and thrive in what seem to be never ending times of difficulty and failure.

Then for the women as always there is a love story. Not only with Peter and Mary Jane, we will get back to that later, but now you have the tragedy of Dr Octavius and his wife. The action and horror that springs from Doc Ock is really fueled but the sadness the he feels from losing his wife and knowing that it was his fault. They were so much in love and she believed in him but she was to close when the experiment went south and he survived but she didn’t and he just can’t get over that. Then as always there is our hero and his love interest only this time it has gotten complicated. Peter and Mary Jane love each other but Peter doesn’t want her to suffer because he is Spiderman and in order to insure her safety he can’t be with her. It kills him to say it and let her go but he does it anyway, well at least for as long as he can stay away that is.   

There are many twists and turns, and they did do a fair job with this movie so here in 9^th place I say it deserves the $373,585,825 that it made. IMDB gives it a 7.7/10 and I give it an 8/10.

#8 LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING

With this final installment to the Lord of the Rings series they really just hit it out of the park. Honestly when I first looked at the list of movies I expected it to be higher up on the list because like Avatar this movie was really just above and beyond the norm. First there are the graphics; the work that they did with this movie was just great there was so much work in the computer generated characters that….I can’t even tell you. Me personally, I got shivers when I saw some of the scenes especially the flying ones over the volcano it was spectacular.

Once again Lord of the Rings the Return of the King and Avatar I think really paralleled each other. They are both great graphic accomplishments of their time, they both have romance, action, battle, war, and the list goes on and on. Most importantly they signify the survival of a world and a struggle to save home and the lives of many.

So the graphics aside there is the multiple sided plot line that encompasses not only the journey of the ring to be destroyed but the story of each of the individual characters. To start with there is the growing up with the hobbits, even though they are older then they look they are children in reality that have never really had any troubles in their lives until now.  So there are Merry and Pippin the troublemakers’ gone war bound and in the process becoming men, no longer stealing fireworks and causing trouble. Then there is Sam whom at the end of the story has a family and children, and a story that will be passed down from generation to generation. Finally there is Frodo whom in the end can never go back to the life that was once his because he can never be the same person after bearing the burden of the ring. So at the end of his story he leaves on the ship with the others that have lived only to see the moment when the ring was destroyed. On that ship with Frodo is; Gandalf, Elrod, Bilbo, ect those that have seen far to much in their lives to even live among men again and so in the end they sail off to a happier place for them.

It’s all just so emotional I don’t know about you guys but the good bye’s and especially the reunions made me want to cry. My favorite is when Aragorn is made king he meets Arwen they share a happy moment and kiss, but then he continues on through the crowd and when he comes to the hobbits it is not them that bows to him it is he and everyone else there that bow to them. It was just such a feeling of true gratitude and of finality that you just know that it’s done it’s over with and that everyone is going to be going their separate ways. I know that a lot of die hard Lord of the Rings fans cried when the movie ended.

In a separate sense;

One we have the battles and gore that I usually equate with the male population. They are all over the place with the sequences that they created; in the air on birds, on the elephants swinging around, on the ground man to man, and on horse back. All well thought out intricate and fantastic. They really put some thought into where they put everyone and they different fighting styles that they have, all the way down to the competition between Legolas and Gimli. It all contributes to the overall effect of the adrenaline pumping action that they have going on.

Two we have the love story between Arwen and Aragorn the love that is kind of forbidden but that in the end everyone just accepts that it has happened and that it isn’t going to change. Besides if you ask me everyone wanted it to happen so it was going to happen whether you like it or not. It’s more of a female thing but it really brings something to the way that things end in the movie and that they end up happy together.

Three for both sides we have some hot male and female actors, and who doesn’t love a good looking flying around crazy talented elf. That’s right you know who I’m talking about…LEGOLAS and ARWEN!! That’s right who doesn’t want to watch Orlando Bloom sprinting around shooting down enemies with the deadly shot of his arrow, and anyone that says that the fine Liv Tyler isn’t amazing as the unearthly beautiful Arwen is crazy.

All in all I say that this movie has a little bit of something for everyone. It is once again not something that I would recommend for younger kids because…well frankly the Orcs are some creepy looking creatures, and having blood and guts flying around well just isn’t really for younger kids. Other then that I think that it’s a great movie and they finished out the series with a bang, it was a top-notch finish to a great book tribute. IMDB gives it a 8.8/10 and I give it a 9/10 I think that it more then deserves the $377,027,325 that it made and honestly I expected it to be higher up I liked it some much. Nice Job!

#7 STAR WARS EPISODE III REVENGE OF THE SITH

When most people think Star Wars I would say they think maybe a little nerdy depending upon which generation you come from. Some will think the original movies that were a little cheesy and well to be honest I just don’t know what to think of them since the first three episodes were made. Its all most like they went backwards in time instead of getting more advanced and what not the ships are the same or look old and dysfunctional, although I guess you have to take into consideration the fact that they’ve been in a war for some time now. Enough of that though. With a great many of my generation and an ever growing group that is they think action, battles, sleek space-cruisers (not ships that’s to old school), lightsabers, stormtroopers, revenge, love, and loss. That’s a lot to be going on in one single blast, but I would say that for such an old story Star Wars Episode III well deserves the $380270577 that it has taken in.

Episode III is really devoted to the development of Anakin as a person and his transfer over to the darkside that all those involved saw as inevitable due to his attachment to those that he loves. He goes against all the rules and falls in love with Padme and worse yet he actually goes as far as to marry her and get her pregnant. Big problem and not the easiest thing to hide from those around you your especially friends for that matter. In the long run the deciding factor for Anakin really is his relationship and his love for Padme he gives up everything for her so that he can save her because he sees her dying and because of that he causes it.

There are a lot of complicated scenarios in this episode that I think the others were really missing. For the others it is really more of a battle prone movie set-up where they are fighting for their lives through most of it, there is the underlying power struggle and the fight between good and evil but nothing like this one. With Revenge of the Sith they take more of a storyline and add the battles to the storyline. The main story is the change in Anakin and the break down of everything; power, the republic (or more precisely the change to the federation), the jedi, friendships, family ties, the list just goes on and on.

As is with all Star Wars movies the primary weapon of choice to the jedi’s and sith alike is the lightsaber so for those science fiction buffs that we have there are the battles of the elite that have mastered this weapon. Then there are the respective allies that come with both sides. So we take the singular battle and blow it up so those that like action, and gore in a peculiar way, have a satisfactory all out war waging between the two sides. If that doesn’t make it interesting enough we have betrayal to throw into the mix. There are the drones that fight with the sith or darkside and the stormtroopers that fight with the jedi, at first that is. Little do the jedi know the stromtroopers have been honed into the slaves of the sith and will betray them. In a single fell swoop they manage to kill just about every last jedi that there is left. The only ones that escape and survive are Yoda and Obi-Wan and Anakin but at this point he is really Darthvader and a sith so I wouldn’t count him.

Talk about an agenda…and so the plot thickens. This is what makes the movie so great is the balance between what is really almost intellectual because of how elaborately it is planned out and the pure muscle of the battles and warfare. It makes it so that no matter what kind of action you like the movie really does have a god fit. However the movie isn’t all action as I said before. There is love and relationships, and friendship that all tie into the action.

Padme is the key to it all just because the decision of good and evil really lies with Anakin. They are the ones that you want to have together for things to work out and everything be all right, but they are also, for lack of a better statement, the star crossed lovers like Romeo and Juliet. It is really their story that defines and decides the fate of the universe and the path that life will take when they make that decision. Then there is Obi-Wan and Anakin they think of each other as brothers but when push comes to shove they are separated by beliefs of right and wrong, and are forced to fight for their lives…against each other L. Then there is family Padme is brought to safety before she dies but in their words ‘she has lost the will to live’ so she has the babies names them and dies. However that leaves what is to be done with the babies up in the air. They figure they need to hide them from Anakin so old family from Tatooine is called upon to take the young Luke and Senator Bail Organa and his wife offer to take Leia.

There is emotion, action, plot, and theme all rolled into one and it makes for quite a wonderful movie that appeals to a lot of different people. This episode out of all of them I would have to say was the least appropriate for little kids but it was great all the same. IMDB gives it a 7.8/10 and I give it an 8/10. Great job and even though it has been a while I hope they make the rest of the movie. It would be super cool!

#6 TRANSFORMERS REVENGE OF THE FALLEN

Not that I didn’t love the first Transformers movie but I have to say the second one…WOW…it was top notch in my book. The story continues in the sequel to Transformers with some new and some old faces, more comedy and more danger. In Transformers Revenge of the Fallen, coming in our sixth place with $402111870, Sam Witwicky is off to college and Mikaela Banes is home doing her own thing. They are seeing if their relationship can stand the trial of space when Sam has a mental melt down in a lecture after touching a piece of the cube. In turn giving back as we all know the transformers are so great at doing the cube makes Sam a fountain of knowledge to the history of the transformers. Hmm not something that the decepticons can let pass especially since they want what is in his head. So once again Sam is thrown into the war between good and evil, decepticon verse autobot.

Not only are there the our two favorite characters and couple returning to the action but the hunky Major William Lennox is running a new task force that’s main concern is taking care of the unruly transformers that have decided to terrorize earth with their presence. Lennox is in the midst of trying to keep the aliens invading a secret from the public population when he and Sam are both, in a way, called to action to try and solve the decepticon problem with a more focus and a plan. They are going to try and beat the decepticons to the key that will probably completely destroy earth.

Wow talk about complicated circumstances. Sam and Mikaela are just trying to go on with life like everything is normal, trying to live with the fact that the autobots, who are their friends, are here to stay but that with them come the decepticons. Sam is trying to keep Mikaela out of the line of fire but she refuses to let him go at this alone, unfortunately his family also happen to get involved so Sam has to worry about all of their safety while trying to save the world. That’s a lot of pressure for one guy to have to deal with when he doesn’t really understand the information that he has been given in the first place.

For those action junky movie goers this is the cream of the crop. In fact that is really the core to this movie the battle that is ever going on between the good and evil transformers, decepticon verse autobot. The autobots have aligned themselves with the humans in order to try and save earth from destruction, so that what happened to their home planet doesn’t happen here. They also have a little secondary bit of incentive with the hope of finding the all spark the key power source to saving the transformers or at least to keep them going. “The Fallen” want revenge on earth for preventing the power harvesting of their sun to power the all spark and they have chosen know to take it by activating the harvester on earth. Yea bad news for the people of earth, I say death by freezing not so pretty.

So fighting, slashing, battling…etc. All great fun but I would say that the underlying story is what is really important and makes the movie such a great success. Of course for those that love a good love story there is Sam and Mikaela, the slacker nobody that gets the hot popular girl. Surprisingly they work together and they are like a normal couple. Like real life they are struggling, they go off in their own direction start to live their lives and struggle with the long distance relationship. They love each other yet they hate each other, he wants to protect her, she doesn’t want to go without him. Its cute and me personally, I want them to stay together and beat this and survive to go on and live life. Even though they come from different worlds in more then one way they seem to be meant to be together which gives a little extra to the storyline.

The relationship between the humans involved and the autobots is the one that I dub the most important, no matter how much destruction they go through they go at it and try to make things right. Optimus Prime is the leader of the autobots and he works strategically with the military to help them try to get the upper hand on the decepticons and to try and give them technological advantages so that they can fight against them. Then there is Bumblebee that is like Sam’s own personal protector. He has stayed with Sam since they first met up in the first movie and there is very little that can be done to separate Bumblebee from Sam’s side. When trouble starts to arise Bumblebee goes to school to find Sam and warn him that there is trouble arising. They truly feel sorry that the humans have to suffer and host all these mechanical monsters that are trying to destroy them. For alien machines they seem to have quite an emotional connection to the people and doing what it right. This really gives substance to the plot line and the overall effect of the movie.

IMDB gives this movie a 6/10 I however think that they deserve a lot more credit and would say that this movie is at least an 8/10. It was a little violent for younger kids and you did really have to like action and adventure in order to get into it, but it was well done and an enjoyable watch.

#5 SPIDERMAN

This is the first installment of the Spiderman series where we are first introduced to the young Peter Parker the nerdy photographer for the school paper. They go on a class trip to a lab where they are testing on spiders Peter Parker is watching Mary Jane Watson trying to work up the courage to talk to her when his friend Harry Osborn beats him to the punch in a way. He’s trying to flirt and tells her to pose so he can take a picture for the paper. She does but gets beckoned and goes afterwards and ….oh my god Peter gets bitten by a spider!

At first he doesn’t realize what is happening he just doesn’t feel well at first then all the sudden he wakes up and feels great. Better then he ever has before. Better yet he has muscles and doesn’t need his glasses any longer. It’s like a miracle and he just doesn’t understand how it could have happened. With these new found factors he also finds that he has quite the grip and reflexes, and because of these Peter finds himself in some sticky situations like at school he catches Mary Jane and her tray before they crash in the lunchroom. Then because of it a big jock comes after him and to everyone’s surprise it isn’t Peter that needs to go to the hospital. With his new ‘spidy-senses’ he sees the attack coming and dodges it and takes the other guy down and gives him a black eye.

No Way

!

With this he decides to start experimenting and tries to use his new found talents for personal gain. Rule number one don’t do this. Let’s just say cage fight…Peter gets ripped off by the pit boss…lets the robber get away…REVENGE! Ben is guardian and uncle gets shot and killed in the escape. It makes for a very complicated and sentimental set up. Off trying to find yourself when your world is turned upside down and inside out. Peter has suddenly gone from the scrawny nobody to the super hero kid trying to figure it all out.

It’s a huge conflict, for a kid in reality, to take on. Not only that but what has happened to him is not normal so it’s not like has can really turn to anyone for advice. Then there is Mary Jane the girl that he loves but he’s trying to push away so that she doesn’t get in harms way. He’s so confused and feels like everything is his fault for such a time that he kind of gives up on what he has been doing, protecting the city. He just goes back to being Peter Parker but he knows that he can’t do that forever that he has to get out there and follow his destiny even if it kills himself in the process of trying to make things right.

WOW…talk about confusion and action. This is the epitome of a great comic book to movie cross over. Personally I have never read the comic so I don’t know if it corresponds but the story live that they have got going on is great and really meets the expectations that I think a lot of people had for this movie. There is the comic hero storyline for the male population, those that are of the younger generation and older. Then there is the romance and complicated family maters that are more along the lines for the female population.

The hero part is blow up and expanded out into the heated battle scenes with the Green Goblin and the attacks that are made on those that Peter loves because Norman Osborn as the Green Goblin has figured out that Peter and Spiderman are one in the same. Not only has Peter lost practically everyone in his life but those that are left are being threatened and targeted all the time. May Parker is nearly killed the night that Osborn aka the Green Goblin figures out Peter’s little secret of being the Spiderman. Talk about complicated family matters that need to be resolved. The heated battle between the two expands out into the rest of the family when Harry declares war on Spiderman for the wrongful death of his father. Hmm…Harry and Peter best friends, most of the time, Harry and Spiderman mortal enemies in the eyes of Harry.

All in all the combination between the heated fights where Spiderman is swinging through the city and when he is saving people and the base storyline of Peter trying to maintain a home life and everything together with his struggle to keep the ones that he loves, Mary Jane and May, makes for a great combination movie for a great many viewers. Once again a little violent for younger kids but not so much that they can’t see it at all. It defiantly deserves the $403706375 that is has made. IMDB gives it a 7.4/10 but I give it a 8/10 for the great movie that they put out there but also the great snippets of Tobey Maguire without a shirt on and in that slimming spandex J.