At the Daily Bugle, Betty Bryant leads the street bum into Jameson’s office. The bum has Spider-Man’s costume in a bag. Jonah is excited. “He’s out. He’s given up! Thrown in the towel! He abandoned his sad masquerade.” The bum sells the costume to Jameson, who is overjoyed. The audience laughs at his extreme behavior.
The Daily Bugle headlines blares at him: Spider-Man No More! Peter walks past an alley and sees two men beating up on a third, but he walks away because he is no longer Spider-Man and no longer wants to get involved. The audience becomes concerned, because Peter’s decision now has a cost to the community.
Peter and Aunt May are at the grave of Uncle Ben. Two years have passed. This creates sympathy for Aunt May and Peter. Back at Aunt May’s house: “It was not fair that he was taken this way. He was a peaceful man. It’s my fault.” She blamed herself, when she had been sitting at home not involved in any of it. “You wanted to take the subway, I told him to drive you,” she says. “I’m responsible,” says Aunt May. The audience has sympathy for Aunt May because they know she is not really responsible.
Peter confesses to her. ”I could have stopped the thief, but I let him go. I even held the door open for him. He stole Uncle Ben’s car, and shot him.” says Peter. He was seeking absolution. Peter takes Aunt May’s hand, but she pulls away. Aunt May gets up and walks up the stairs to her room. She tells Peter that she wants him to go! The audience has more sympathy for Peter because he is rejected by his Aunt, one of the only true friends that he has in his life.
At Harry Osborn’s apartment, the butler Bernard leaves him for the night. Doc Ock comes into the room. He wants more Tritium. ”We’ll make a deal,” says Harry. “Kill Spider-Man and I’ll give you what you need!” says Harry. “On second thought, don’t kill him. I’ll never have closure if this ends like this, with the chance of never seeing him again. Bring him back to me…alive. Do that, and I promise you can have all the Tritium you want!”
“How do I find him?” asks Doc Ock.
“Peter Parker. He takes pictures of Spider-Man. Make him tell you where he is.”
But don’t hurt Peter! He is my best friend!” yells Harry at the departing Doc Ock. Peter is now in grave danger.
Newspaper Headlines: “Crime up 75%.” The community is now in grave danger because of Peter’s decision not to be Spider-Man. Peter is on the street. He sees that a house is on fire. One man is positive that there is a kid on the second floor. Spider-Man no more! But he was still Peter Parker. That would never change and Peter Parker has to do something. Peter runs into the burning building. The audience respects and admires Peter for going into a burning building to save the life of a child.
Peter saves the life of the child. A paramedic gives him oxygen then says “some poor soul got trapped on the fourth floor and never made it out!” Peter feels bad for not being able to save the man that died.
“Am I not supposed to have what I want? What I need?” What am I supposed to do?” says Peter to himself when he is back in his apartment alone. The audience feels sympathy for Peter.
Ursula, the landlord’s daughter, knocks on Peter’s door. “Would you like a piece of chocolate cake?” she asks. They eat together. When they are done she tells him that his aunt called for him.
This act of friendship shows Peter that he is not alone, and there are other people in the world who like him.
When he arrives at his Aunt May’s house, she is packing boxes in her driveway. She has found a small apartment. “You made a brave move. And I am proud of you, and I thank you, and I love you, Peter…so very, very much.” The audience is relieved that Aunt May has forgiven Peter. If she forgives him, then they can forgive him, too.
Henry Jackson is a little boy helping Aunt May. “You take SpiderMan’s pictures, don’t you?” he asks Peter. ‘Where is he?” “He quit.”
“Why?”
“Wanted to try other things,” says Peter.
“You’ll never guess who he wants to be. Spider-Man. He knows a hero when he sees one. There are too few characters out there flying around like that and saving old girls like me. And Lord knows, kids like Henry need a hero. Courageous, self-sacrificing people, setting examples for us all,” says Aunt.
“Everybody loves a hero. People line up for them, cheer them, and scream their names. And years later tell how they stood for hours in the rain just to catch a glimpse of the one who taught them to hold on a second longer. I believe there is a hero in all of us who keeps us honest, gives us strength, makes us noble, and finally allows us to die with pride, even though sometimes we have to be steady, and give up the thing we want the most. Even our dreams! Spider-Man did that for Henry, and he wonders where he has gone. Henry needs him.” Peter feels good about himself because he realizes that his efforts have been appreciated, and the sacrifices that Spider-Man has made have not been in vain.
Eight stories up in the heart of New York City, Peter stares at the twenty-foot chasm that stretches between himself and the next rooftop…he keeps telling himself that his strength is back. Peter is trying to demonstrate to himself that his powers have returned.
Peter runs and jumps off the building, but realizing that his arc was not sufficient to clear the distance, Peter Parker emits a high pitched scream. Then he drops like a ballast bag tossed from a balloon, flailing his arms about, trying to find something to grab onto. He slams down onto the cars below. He hurts his back. His powers have not returned because he has not gotten back the love of the woman he loves.
As Peter walks away he touches one of the cars. This sets off a car alarm. The audience laughs at this bit of humor. MJ is looking at her wedding invitations. John Jameson is stretched out on the couch in MJ’s apartment. “Are you sure that you don’t want to invite your friend Peter Parker?”
“Peter Parker is a great big jerk.” says MJ. She is still angry at Peter. ”Put your head back,” she tells John. She comes around to the other side, then leans in and kisses his upside-down face. She has never kissed him like this before. But it is not the same. The audience has empathy for MJ because they do not want her to make a mistake and marry the wrong man. This is why she has to make sure and kiss Peter.
Mary Jane sits at a table in the window of Ari’s Village Deli and Bakery. Peter approaches the table. They talk, and Peter tells her he made a mistake. He cannot be there for her. MJ is upset.
There is danger in this scene. The audience is afraid that Peter and MJ will not get back together.
“Kiss me,” says MJ. “I need to know something.” She draws closer to him, and he to her. The audience hopes they will be reunited. Suddenly she sees his eyes go wide in alarm. The restaurant’s plate glass restaurant window shatters and a car hurls directly at them. The audience is terrorized by the situation.
Peter slams to the ground with Mary Jane and desperately rolls to the side, just avoiding having the car’s back tire run over his face. The vehicle fishtails, and then crashes to a halt at the back of the restaurant. The audience is relieved that Peter and MJ are not killed.
It is Doc Ock. He confronts Peter. “I want you to find your friend Spider-Man.” He picks up Peter and slams him into the wall. The ceiling collapses on Peter. “Find him or I’ll peel the flesh off her bones.” The audience hates Doc Ock for threatening MJ. Peter becomes enraged. Doc Ock throws Peter against the wall. Doc Ock grabs Mary Jane and carries her away, laughing all the while. Peter jumps out from under the debris and in a rage starts after Doc Ock. Peter takes off his glasses. He doesn’t need them any more. Peter’s rage and the love of MJ has empowered him.
At the Daily Bugle Robbie says, “No news of your son’s fiancée.” “It’s all my fault,” said Jameson. “I drove him away.”
“He was the only one who could have stopped Doc Ock,” says Robbie. Jameson is now in jeopardy due to his false accusations.
Peter quickly leans into the room and takes his costume from the wall. “Spider-Man was a hero. I just couldn’t see it,” says Jonah. Jameson screams
when he realizes that Spider-Man has taken back his suit. He starts verbally attacking Spider-Man again. The audience laughs at Jameson’s quick change of attitude.
Ock sits perched on a giant clock tower, waiting patiently, as SpiderMan swing closer and closer. “Where is she?”
“She’s nearby. Quite safe.”
Spider-Man fights Doc Ock. Together they fall onto a train as they continue to fight. Two of Doc Ocks tentacles wrap down and around and crashed into the front cab. The engineer falls back, screaming in alarm, as one of the arms slam the accelerator into overdrive and then snapped off the lever. With another swift blow, the emergency brake system is shattered. The train begins to speed up. The community is now in jeopardy.
Doc Ock grabs two people from the train, and throws them into the air. As Spider-Man struggles to save them, Doc Ock gets away. SpiderMan returns to the train. His mask catches on fire, so he takes it off. ”I can’t stop it,” says the engineer. ”The brakes are busted!” Peter looks up ahead to see that beyond the station lay a dead end. Worse, some yards beyond the dead end, the track just stops. The result is an eighty-foot drop-off beyond the dead end.
The lives of all the people in the train are now at stake.
Spider-Man tries to stop the train by putting his feet on the tracks, but that does not work. His first efforts have failed. The audience’s anxiety level increases since they do not know how he will be able to stop this runaway train.
The train is not slowing down. Spider-Man could have jumped clear; it would have been no problem. Instead he starts firing those fantastic web-strands of his. He snags onto the passing buildings, but all that he seems to accomplish was to rip off chunks of brick and mortar and ledge. The train slowed, but not remotely enough. The edge of the track is looming. It is hopeless. The audience is driven to a frenzy of excitement. But Spider-man keeps trying. Right up to the edge the train rolls, and almost over, but then it stopped. The audience is relieved that no one has died.
At the precipice the train stops. But Spider-Man, exhausted, is about to fall forward. The conductor grabs him and with help from others pull him back into the car. They lift him up and carried him above their heads. Someone takes the mask off Spider-Man. The conductor looks down at the battered and bruised face of their unlikely savior. “He’s just a kid, no older than my son.” The members of the train care about Spider-Man, and so does the audience because they watched his efforts to stop the train from going over the edge.
Doc Ock appears. “Stand back, He’s mine!” Everyone on the train closes ranks over the fallen hero. “You don’t scare me pal,” says one beefy fellow. “You want him you have to come through me?” “Very well,” said Doc Ock. He descended upon them and knocked them all aside. He scoops up the unconscious Spider-Man and carries him away. The audience is anxious about what will happen to SpiderMan.
Back at Harry Osborn’s apartment, Doc Ock appears with SpiderMan dangling from his tentacles. He is wrapped in some sort of barbed wire. Doc Ock drops him carelessly onto the chaise. Doc Ock takes the Tritium from the safe, then leaves.
Harry picks up a dagger and approaches Spider-Man. He steps next to him and lifts the dagger high. Then he stops and asks, “First, let’s see who’s behind the mask. Then I can look into your eyes as you die, Spider-Man.” This is Spider-Man’s most desperate moment. The audience believes that Harry will kill him.
As he pulls off Spider-Man’s mask, a blast of lightning chooses that moment to strike, and Harry stares down in stupefaction at the face of Peter Parker, illuminated in the harsh glare of the lightning. “Peter.” Harry staggers back as the dagger falls from his hand. “No, it can’t be!” Spider-Man jumps up and frees himself. The audience is relieved that Harry does not kill Spider-Man.
“Harry, he took Mary Jane!”
“All he wanted was the Tritium.”
“Tritium? Harry, he is making the machine again. When that happens MJ will die, along with half of New York! Now, where is he?” “Peter, you killed my father!”
“There are bigger things happening here than me and you, Harry. Please….”
The community is a stake now, not just the lives of three people: Peter, Harry, and MJ.
At the old wharf Doc Ock is working with his fusion machine. He has MJ tied to a post. The life of the protagonist’s love interest is at stake. ”You got what you needed for your little science project, now let me go!” she yells.
”I can’t let you go. You’ll bring the authorities. Not that anyone can stop me, now that Spider-Man is dead.”
“He’s not dead! I don’t believe you.”
“Believe it,” he assured her.
Doc Ock fires up his machine to an even more earsplitting level. The stuff hanging in the middle suddenly ignited, and to Mary Jane’s wonderment, it takes on the aspect of a tiny golden sun, no bigger than an orange, forming in the middle of the machine. The pulsating light reveals Spider-Man crawling along the ceiling.
“Shut it down, Octavius! You’re going to hurt a lot more people this time!” says Spider-Man. The whole of New York City is at risk.
Mary Jane sees the glowing ball continue to grow, and she pulls at the chains with rising desperation. All at once she was lifted off her feet, and finds her ankles being pulled toward the fiery ball. The only things holding her in place are the chains that bound her wrists to the rusted pipe. The audience is excited because it looks like MJ will be killed.
The chains around her hands snap off the rusted pipe, and Mary Jane is yanked through the air directly toward the glowing ball. One of SpiderMan’s web-lines has snagged her wrists, halting her, suspending her horizontally in midair. The aggressive machinery is pulling her in one direction while Spider-Man is doing everything he can to haul her in the other. The excitement rises to a frenzy level.
Doc Ock is knocked down. Then, as if emerging from a dream, Doc Ock wakes up. Peter tries to persuade Doc Ock to destroy the machine. Doc Ock fights the metal snake arms for control of his mind. “Don’t listen to them,” says Peter.
“But it was my dream.”
“Sometimes we must give up our dreams to do what is right!” This is the moral of this movie. Doc Ock agrees.
“Now tell me how to stop it,” says Peter.
“It can’t be stopped, unless...the river. Drown it.”
“I’ll do it,” says Doc Ock. The audience regains admiration for Otto. He was just temporarily crazy. He still has time to redeem himself.
MJ sees Spider-Man without his mask and knows he is Peter! A golden halo glow surrounds them. She expresses her love and joy at realizing that Peter and Spider-Man are one. The audience is also happy. But in this moment of happiness, disaster strikes. The wall suddenly falls down toward MJ. Spider-Man struggles to keep it off them, but it is very heavy. They profess their love for each other.
Octavius pulls the fusion ball down over him. “I will not die a monster!” says Doc Ock as he drags the ball of fire into the river. Spider-Man then throws the wall off them. He picks up MJ then jumps over a metal frame that is rolling towards them.
MJ and Spider-Man sit on a grid above the river.
“I think I always knew, all the time, who you were,” says MJ. “You know why we can’t be together. Spider-Man will always have enemies. I can never let you take that risk. I will always be Spider-Man. You and I can never be.” This is a moment of sadness for the audience because it appears that the lovers will not be united. He lowers her to the ground. The audience shares MJ’s sadness. Police cars arrive below. John Jameson comes out and hugs her. He is relieved that she is not harmed. They kiss. Spider-Man jumps into the night.
Harry Osborn is home alone. He hears the voice of his father telling him to kill Peter. He wants Harry to avenge him. Harry screams “NO!” He throws a dagger into the mirror, which is reflecting his father’s image. There, in the space revealed by the broken mirror, the face of the Green Goblin is starring back at him. The audience is happy that Harry will finally learn the truth
about his father and the Green Goblin.
The mask is not moving or talking to him. It merely hangs there. There is an entire hidden workshop behind the mirror. There was a familiar glider on its stand and the armored suit in a case. The confusion gives way to growing horror, then to the realization that totally reordered his world. The audience is concerned that Harry will also become crazy like his father and perhaps still try to kill Spider-Man.
At the church MJ is preparing for her wedding. She is dressed in white and looks at herself in the mirror. John is at the church altar. Music starts playing “Here comes the Bride!” The audience is afraid that MJ will make a mistake and marry the wrong man. One of the maids of honor runs down the alley and gives John a note. J.J. Jameson reacts. He tells his wife to call Jackie, the caterer, and tell her not to open the caviar. The joke breaks the tension and allows the audience to laugh.
MJ, in her white wedding dress, runs through the park. She is happy, and the audience shares her happiness. Peter is sitting on the bed in his apartment. Suddenly MJ, is in the doorway wearing her wedding gown. “Had to do what I had to do! Peter, I can’t survive without you! I know that there may be risks, but I want to face them with you. It’s wrong that we should only be half-alive, half of ourselves. Isn’t it about time that somebody saved your life?” “Thank you Mary Jane Watson.” The emotional tension the audience feels is released, and they are happy that MJ and Peter will express their love for each other. Peter takes MJ into his arms and kisses her.
Suddenly, the howling of sirens floated through the window. Mary Jane simply smiles. ”Go get them, tiger,” she says. The audience is happy that MJ will let Peter be Spider-Man.
Spider-Man hurls above the streets of New York City. The audience is exhilarated by Spider-Man’s actions. Mary Jane stands by the window of Peter’s apartment and looks out after him.
The Megahit Movies Page 36