“What do I think of Spider-Man? He’s a criminal, that’s who he is!” boasted J. In 2002, less than a year after Americans were rocked by 9/11, Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man hit theaters. In place of Jameson are millennial editors with tote bags who staff websites based in Brooklyn and SoHo.

Though Jameson first debuted in 1963, he’s more or less frozen in his archetype of a disgruntled 1940s newspaper publisher who spoke truth to power, cigar in his mouth mixed with the smell of black coffee. Jonah Jameson that, ahem, kids today (“How do you do…”) may find foreign. Virtually the whole series was perfectly cast to a terrifying degree: Tobey Maguire as a milky, awkward nerd struggling to learn responsibility, Kirsten Dunst was an awakening for anyone going through puberty, both Willem Dafoe and Alfred Molina delivered villains with pathos and emotional gravity, and Cliff Robertson and Rosemary Harris became father and mother figures for a whole generation.īut there’s one casting decision that was so pitch perfect it was almost disturbing: Oscar-winner J.K. Elements of Evil Dead can be found in his Spider-Man the hospital massacre carried out by a sleeping Doc Ock in Spider-Man 2 manically pogo jumps in the spectrum of goofy hilarity and genuine terror.

Raimi, a quirky artist who came from the movie equivalent of a garage punk band, proved his whacky voice early in his career, most especially through the comedy-horror Evil Dead films. That’s not to say the Raimi films were stodgy or self-important. Where the Marvel Cinematic Universe treats the comics like toys from a toy box, playing around with whatever feels fresh and fun, the Raimi films treated the “toys” like meticulous scale model replicas. What we can tell you is that, if you happened to miss the original Spider-Man trilogy from director Sam Raimi, you should definitely do that before seeing the next Spider-Man movie in theaters next week.īesides the fact they’re all great movies (yes, even Spider-Man 3, which has its merits), the Raimi movies - 2002’s Spider-Man, 2004’s Spider-Man 2, and 2007’s Spider-Man 3 - all had a secret weapon: An impeccable cast. You can read this entire post free from any spoilers for Spider-Man: Far From Home.

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