Spider-Man 3
Spider-Man 3 is the third of the Sam Raimi Spider-Man films.
Peter Parker's life has finally reached success. New York doesn't seem to be gunning for him, he's with the girl of his dreams, and he's managing to balance his normal life with the life of Spider-Man. But his happy complacency is spoiled once Harry Osborn, having discovered Pete is Spider-Man, decides to take his father's Goblin serum and comes hunting for Peter. Meanwhile, escaped convict Flint Marko is turned into the shapeshifting Sandman after entering a particle accelerator, and is revealed to have been involved with the same criminal who killed Peter's Uncle Ben. As well, a mysterious alien organism crashes to Earth and bonds with Peter, enhancing his powers but also influencing his behavior for the worse. When this symbiote is abandoned, it finds refuge in a rival, Eddie Brock, Jr., who becomes the maniac Venom.
- Action Survivor: Mary Jane in the final battle.
- Advertised Extra: Venom, though a possible subversion as well. Venom was only in the movie for about ten minutes, but he surprisingly did a lot in ten minutes: He teamed up with Sandman and kidnapped Mary Jane, which led to Peter and Harry's reconciliation, which led to Harry's death, which led to Peter and Mary Jane's reconciliation. Basically, the plot couldn't have wrapped up without Venom taking action.
- This really depends on whether you think of Venom as the combo of Eddie and the symbiote, or just the symbiote. From the idea that Venom is really the symbiote, only needing Eddie as a tool for revenge, then Venom has a lot of scenes, just no dialogue.
- Amnesiac Dissonance: Harry.
- Anti-Villain: Sandman, who became a criminal in order to steal money to save his sick daughter.
- Bash Brothers
- Big Damn Heroes
- Big "Shut Up!": Harry to Peter after Peter tries to explain that he didn't kill Harry's father.
- Bittersweet Ending: Leans more towards the positive side: Harry is dead, and Peter has to come to terms with having acted like a colossal jerk, but he's managed to overcome his dark side, forgiven the man who (accidentally) killed his uncle, and it's implied that his rocky relationship with Mary Jane will heal, and they'll be back together again.
- Cannot Spit It Out
- Chekhov's Gun: Peter discovers that amplified sound (i.e. standing next to a ringing church bell) disrupted the symbiote long enough for Peter to remove it. He uses the same tactic during the final battle.
- Comic Book Movies Don't Use Codenames: Venom is never named at all.
- Crowd Song
- Deus Ex Machina: The butler suddenly revealing the true nature of Norman's death to Harry. Word of God states that he's a hallucination, representing Harry's good side..
- Easy Amnesia
- Evil Costume Switch
- Evil Tastes Good: Harry gets a scene relating to this.
- Four Lines, All Waiting: One of the more common complaints about the movie was the fact that the presence of three major villains, each of whom has their own plot, as well as the romance plot, left the movie rather crowded.
- Getting Crap Past the Radar: After Harry tells Peter that he's "The other guy":
Waitress: How's the pie? |
- "Miss Brant! That's not the position I hired you for!"
- Good Scars, Evil Scars
- Heel Face Revolving Door
- Hover Board: Adaptation of the Goblin Glider.
- It's All About Me: Peter, Mary Jane, Harry, and Eddie Brock all suffer from this. The first three overcome it. Brock...doesn't.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Mr. Ditkovich, so much. Justified in that landlords of such rundown tenements have to be callous and sometimes ruthless--but that doesn't mean they're heartless.
- Lampshade Hanging: After the first battle with The Sandman, Peter blatantly asks out loud, 'Where do these guys come from?')
- Large Ham: "So goood."
- Littlest Cancer Patient: Flint Marko's daughter.
- Meaningful Background Event
- Nice Girl: Gwen Stacy.
- Nigh Invulnerability: Sandman.
- Not My Driver
- Not Using the Z Word: Eddie Brock after bonding with the symbiote never gets called Venom.
- Likewise, Harry's costumed identity was referred to as "New Goblin" in promotional materials, but he's never called that during the film. However, Peter does taunt Harry by calling him "Little Goblin Junior" at one point.
- Peek-a-Bangs
- Papa Wolf: Sandman was willing to do anything to ensure his daughter is cured of her illness, even if it means having to go through a life of crime to do so.
- Power High: When Peter gets the symbiote, he says, "I feel... wow... this feels good!"
- Precision F-Strike: This is the only time where Peter swears. "You'll get your rent when you fix this damn door!"
- Raimi Vision
- Reckless Gun Usage: How Flint killed Uncle Ben.
- Retcon: Whoops, turns out the guy Spidey killed in the first movie didn't kill Uncle Ben after all, Sandman did!
- Revenge Myopia: The Hobgoblin has this as his motivation. He wants to kill Spidey because Spidey killed the Hobgoblin's father, the Green Goblin. However, just before the movie's climax, his butler reveals that Green Goblin was killed by his own hover-board.
- Rival Turned Evil: Harry.
- Running Gag: How many times can the scenery hit Harry in the forehead?
- Seeking Sanctuary
- Series Finale: During development, the filmmakers weren't sure if there was going to be a Spider-Man 4, so they designed movie 3 to act as a series finale if need be. In retrospect, it seems to have been a wise choice.
- Shipper on Deck: She may like Peter herself, but Ursula is still all for him and MJ.
- Shower of Angst
- Spared by the Adaptation: Gwen.
- Spider Limbs
- Stepping Stones in the Sky
- Step Three: Profit: Step 1, break Peter and Mary Jane up. Step 2, ???? Step 3, SPIDER-MAN IS FINISHED!
- In fairness, breaking up Peter and Mary Jane was probably just to screw with Peter.
- Take It to the Bridge
- Taking the Bullet: Harry.
- Tomboy and Girly Girl: Mary Jane and Gwen Stacy.
- Transformation Trauma
- Unflinching Walk
- Vehicle Vanish: Harry pulls a particularly goofy one on Peter; Peter is looking through a diner's window at Harry, who is sitting, smiling at him before vanishing in such a way that it simply looks like he threw himself to the floor.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Sandman genuinely wants to do good by helping his daughter out of her illness. Unfortunately, he has to steal money from various places as well as Accidental Murder Peter Parker's uncle in order to do so.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Gwen gives this to Peter in the restaurant scene, when she realizes he's only romancing her to humiliate Mary Jane. She even apologizes to MJ before storming off.
- Eddie Brock actually calls out "What the hell!'" when Spider-Man breaks his camera.
- Within Parameters: The scientists running an experiment involving a particle accelerator and sand notice that the weight of the sand is greater than expected. They write it off as a bird that will fly away once the experiment starts. The "bird" is actually Flint Marko, about to be turned into The Sandman. One wonders what 200-pound bird the scientists were thinking of.
- Brilliantly parodied in this video. For brevity's sake, just jump to about 1:50.
- Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: The Sandman.