While out promoting his newest horror offering, Drag Me to Hell, Sam Raimi spoke to Cinematical and the inevitable topic of Spider-Man 4 came to the table.
While no real details about the movie emerged, Raimi made some interesting remarks in regard to his own work on the Spider-Man franchise, and what he hopes to accomplish with a fourth film. In his comments, Raimi seems to be eternally apologizing for his mistakes, where he went wrong, and how passionately he is about making up for it. This of course all stems from Spider-Man 3, which was and still remains to be one of the most negatively criticized superhero movies ever to be made.
I honestly feel badly for Raimi while reading this quote; it’s almost like he requires the fans’ forgiveness and the re-acquiring of their faith and loyalty.
Here’s Raimi on the mistakes he’s made and the lessons he’s learned:
As far as Spider-Man, I’ve learned a lot of lessons about what people didn’t like and missteps that I’d made. But I learned those lessons on the previous two, I was just a little quieter about them. I made a lot of mistakes, and it’s part of the reason I so want to make this next story of Peter Parker.
And Raimi on the character of Spider-Man, how familiar he is with it, and his goal for the fourth movie:
I really think I know in my heart who the character is, and I haven’t quite been able to sing the song yet, or bring it out to the extent or degree of detail that I feel in my heart that I can. And I may not be successful, but I still feel like I know it better than I’m able to play it; I feel like the kid that really practiced at the piano recital, with years of comic books, and when I got to my other recitals, I sometimes made some missteps with them. There’s a whole crowd there and they think that’s as well as I know the piece, but I really do know it a lot better than that and I would like one more chance at that character. The Spider-Man films, I’ve made mistakes, but I really do look at them as things that I’ve learned, and hope that when I apply what I’ve learned to this next one, I really make a film that people enjoy and is really true to the character in a fresh, original way. That’s my goal.
I take two things from these quotes: One, is how good this is for Spider-Man 4 — is Sam Raimi is this passionate and determined to make up for Spider-Man 3, then we could REALLY be in for a treat with the next movie. It’s rare that a director puts this kind of fire into something and genius isn’t the final product. Secondly, I really think Raimi is beating himself up way too much. Yeah, Spider-Man 3 wasn’t as good as we all wanted it to be, but that doesn’t mean the first movie wasn’t great, and that the second movie wasn’t one of the best comic book movies we’ve ever seen. Is Spidey 3 even that bad compared to other comic fare, like Ghost Rider? C’mon now.
If Spider-Man 4 is brilliant and does indeed end up winning all of our love back, then I guess this is all worth it. I do hate to see such a loved and respected director so bothered by one dud, though. Everyone has a bad run, it’s part of the life.
“Is Spidey 3 even that bad compared to other comic fare, like Ghost Rider?” Yes, yes it is. I have 10 times more respect for Ghost Rider, X3, or Wolverine than I ever will for SM3. It’s like watching somebody’s madness on screen. I think it’s one of the worst movies ever made. I just got done watching the fan edit film, “Marvel 24”, where they pretty much took the best parts of SM3 and combined it with other Marvel movies and it was still terrible. Raimi needs to be on his hands and knees begging our forgiveness for that atrocity called Spider Man 3. Anyway, just my 2 cents. Sorry for the rant, that movie just urks me.
That was a good interview, thanks for sharing. I’d like to believe what Raimi says but I’m not counting on it. I guess we don’t have any choice now anyway. Maybe he will surprise us.
Comment by Herb West — May 20, 2009 @ 7:04 pm
Herb has a point. SM3 was terrible. I love the first 2 SM movies(2 more than 1). Cause Doc Oc owned more than the Green Gob. SM3 was over-loaded with the story lines crossing (or rushing), The Emo Peter Parker, and the villains (They pood on Venom and Eddie Brock). YET!!!! I do respect SM3, more so than the Eragon movie….. Now that was horrific and mind numbingly off from the book seeing that the series is good.
Comment by J — May 20, 2009 @ 10:04 pm
I am willing to give him one more shot. At least he’s humble enough to say he made mistakes. If it gets back to the Peter we saw in Spider-Man 2, I’ll pretend 3 never happened. This gave me new hope for a great Spidey sequel again. I don’t care who the villain (SINGULAR, not plural!) is, if its a good script with awesome action/adventure and just the right amount of camp to fit the film, I’m there.
Comment by Slipstream — May 20, 2009 @ 11:43 pm
This is where the logic confuses me.
The man gave us two great Spider-Man movies, and yet people wish to crucify him for the one bad one. The movie math makes no sense.
It’s boggling, really. Yes, boggling.
X-3 is about equal. Ghost Rider was so far and away worse, I can’t see how anyone thinks otherwise. At least with Spidey there were some bright spots and familiar and loved characters in between the bad spots. Ghost Rider was like helplessly watching your puppy get beat up by a bunch of teenagers.
Comment by The Movie God — May 21, 2009 @ 12:45 am
Ghost rider makes spidey 3 look mediocre. I think Raimi can deliver the goods for a fourth installment though, he has the heart for it.
Comment by scrotumbagmonkeyflicker — May 21, 2009 @ 4:24 am
Ghost Rider was utter crap compared to SM3. For the love of all that is good in Marvel, I really expected Scooby Doo and the Mystery Machine Gang to show up, pull the flaming skull mask off Nicholas Cage and then pull the Nick Cage mask off only to reveal Ben Affleck underneath!
Any Ghost Rider film needs to be Rated R – it was a horror comic, not some badly CGIed crap-fest with reject villains from Smallville.
Comment by burning_chrome — May 21, 2009 @ 7:29 am
i don’t know if i would want to pay for the ticket for Spidey 4 after 3. Weeks of excitement turned into the biggest letdown in movie history. I reckon it was called Spider Man 3 cos u see spidey about 3 times in the whole godamn movie. As a fan though i’ll have to see 4 i spose.
Ghost Rider sucked, Spidey 3 sucked, Rise of the Silver Surfer was the biggest waste of money ever and even X3 was pretty lame. I lost faith in Marvel movies, thankfully Iron Man was pant wettingly awesome. but ghost rider is probably the worst movie i have ever seen, except catwoman, yeah tht was worse
Comment by Dr Blitzgeek — May 21, 2009 @ 10:54 am
Spiderman 3 was crap for me because they took the best villain spiderman ever had ( venom ) and you only saw him for maybe 10 minutes out of the whole film and near the end of it you see eddie brocks skeleton turn to dust from a pumpkin bomb there by taking venom out for a return. Raimi has had 3 chances to get this right and he just can’t do it. Give the franchise back to marvel so they can redo it all in their new mavel studios. This franchise is turning out just like the original batman franchise. It should be a rule. One superhero and one supervillain per movie. Otherwise you waste too much time explaining everything and taking away precious time from the main script.
Comment by Ttandc — May 21, 2009 @ 2:28 pm
Is Spidey 3 even that bad compared to other comic fare, like Ghost Rider? C’mon now.
YES
we waited two movies for Venom…seriously..black suit spidey from my childhood on screen, and he spends more time DANCING in the black suit then using it.
just a huge let down.
at least Ghost rider didn’t have two good movies beforehand to make you excited to hear about the third…. it had Nick Cage and you always knew it was going to BLOW.
are you serious??!?!?!
seriously???
you can’t be serious.
thats like saying “godfather 3 isn’t too bad when you compare it to Ghost Dog.
ugh
Comment by mo — May 21, 2009 @ 3:28 pm
I’ll be happy with another spiderman as long as Bruce Campbell does his Cameo!
Comment by Sierra — May 21, 2009 @ 4:06 pm
All of you Venom fans (I share your pain) have to keep in mind that they are working on a Venom spin-off movie, so there’s hope that we can just forget Spider-Man 3 Venom if they do it properly…preferably with Carnage.
Comment by The Movie God — May 21, 2009 @ 6:59 pm