Spider-Man 3: Redemption by Badscooter

As far as the editing goes, it is seamless here. I didn't notice anything jarring or strange.

As for the movie. This edit drastically improves Spider-Man 3 for me. If I watch it in the future, I will be watching this version. The characters and their motivations are all strengthened here. The more cringey elements are gone. Sandman's absurd connection to Peter is completely removed. The only thing no edit can fix unfortunately is the fact that Venom is included in this movie. It should've been just Sandman and the black suit. Sandman's character should've been bolstered a little more (without shoehorning it into Peter's origin story). But again, this edit can only work with what's available.

Despite the things I wish weren't in this movie even after so much is stripped away, this edit does increase my rating by a lot. The original I would give a 6/10. There are definitely good things in there, and the first 45 minutes are just as good as the movies that came before (and that beginning largely remains intact in this edit). But this edit I would give a solid 8/10. I actually enjoyed watching this one and didn't feel disappointed by the end.

Review by Phlegmbot — September 22, 2010 @ 9:18 pm

I’ll say this for my first fan edit viewing: I would never have known it wasn’t edited by a pro.

It looks good and, yes, the story does flow far more smoothly, and, without a doubt, the story of Harry vs. Peter is now at the forefront and is truly the spine of the movie, as it should’ve been. Great job on that.

That said, I always had two big problems w/Spider-Man 3 (a thousand little problems [e.g., why doesn't Spidey's spider-sense ever seem to work in this flick?], but 2 big ones):
1. Films always thrive on coincidence, but there are too many in SM3. Gwen is Peter’s lab partner, the model he saves, daughter of a police captain who arranges to have her give him the key to the city and so on. And Brock is a photog at the Bugle AND Gwen’s beau AND in the church at just the right time…and so on.
2. Everything in the Spidey movie-verse is lab-based, Earth science-based sci-fi. But the symbiote…the symbiote is still from outer space. This works in the comics b/c Spider-Man interacts with characters like The Silver Surfer on a regular basis. In the movie, not so much. (The ani series “Spectacular Spider-Man” resolved this by making all of the characters incredulous at the discovery of life from space…which also worked).

This edit didn’t fix the above two issues, so the level of suspension of disbelief you must utilize to buy the story is still quite high. I hate to knock something w/out offering suggestions for fixing, so below are my thoughts — pardon me if I go on a bit….

My recommendation would be to OPEN the film w/an establishing shot of ESU and then we cut to the Doc Conners/Peter Parker scene where they’re looking at the alien symbiote, and perhaps extend the time at ESU with cut or existing scenes from this movie or even the earlier ones….we then segue into nighttime with Pete & MJ on the web looking at the stars, SKIP the meteor landing, but show that the symbiote is now on his bike. So not only is the symbiote some kind of ESU lab experiment now, it is apparently following Peter from the get-go. Pete who was already warned (by Conners) not to touch it.

Gwen also doesn’t work in any way (in spite of the great efforts of our erstwhile editing genius) — her character has no arc and is hardly any kind of foil for MJ. But she’s there for drama and for Peter to basically use. So, pardon my backseat editing, but if I had the ability to do this, I’d:
1. Alter the crane accident to make it a generic Spidey saves the day scene. No close-ups of Gwen, which, in a sense, would take her OUT of the scene.
2. I believe there’s a scene in the original of Gwen as his lab partner, yes? Keep that. (Or did I dream it?)
3. Excise Gwen from Spider-Man Day. Maybe use Gwen’s audio (but perhaps deepen the voice so it sounds like some city official) over shots of the crowd and cut to Spidey doing tricks and showing off, then see MJ leaving; crop the shot of Spidey giving a thumbs up so we only see him (a little video degradation would be acceptable here in my book).
4. The proposal/restaurant scene remains unchanged until Gwen’s exit: from there, you can slice MJ’s audio track. If MJ just says “How come you never mentioned her? She’s your lab partner? She thinks you’re a genius and had her polished nails all over you?” Peter: “She’s just a girl in my class.” MJ: “Do you want to push me away?…” and everything else remains to the end of the scene.
5. It also looks like some clever editing can take the dancing scene in the jazz club out. Pete’s being a jerk from the get-go, and that could be made clear differently, with Gwen storming out and Peter still fighting w/the club bouncers.

Man, I wish I had the talent or the time for this. I’m still very impressed with the look and flow of this edit, but until the major two issues are resolved, the movie itself still comes off as too darned weak.

Review by DwightFry78 — August 15, 2010 @ 8:22 am

NOTE: This review is based on the DVD version.

Spider-Man 3. The black sheep in the saga of the webshooting hero. The main problem about it being that it was a movie at odds with itself: at the same time the campiest and the darkest in the series, the most comedic and the most dramatic. In the same movie we had the hero beating his girlfriend and almost becoming a murderer, AND goofing around in sequences out of a ZAZ spoof. Well, that’s no longer the case in Badscooter’s reshaping of it: he has focused in the human drama and the love triangle between Peter, MJ, and Harry, and also in the darker aspects of the plot, pushing extraneous elements centering on the villains and parallel plots to the background, and losing almost all of the goofy comedy and plot contrivances. Which results in a much improved watching experience.

PLOT: Now the center of it is Peter’s relationship with MJ. That’s what moves the story along and what motivates the fall and recovery of Spidey. A major change, and huge improvement, is that now Flint Marko had nothing to do with Uncle Ben’s murder, and this removal is achieved in a way in which no one would suspect that was the case in the original if they had never seen it. No traces left at all. Thus, Peter’s descent into the dark side is now motivated by personal love life failure. And it will be his love for MJ what saves him (and her) in the end. Harry’s character arc runs parallel to this, and thanks to a key change near the end, what makes him ultimately tick will be love and friendship as well. It’s now more than ever a story of (as the subtitle aptly puts it) redemption. Still, if you thought the love triangle was soap opera in the original, you’ll think the same thing about this. There’s only as much that fanediting can fix. 9/10.

IMAGE QUALITY: Remarkably good. It’s SD DVD, but the source was Blu-Ray and the video is clean and crisp. There might be some very minimal stuttering and also very slight pixelization in fast motion-heavy shots, but one has to be looking for them, and looking really close, to notice. As for the edits, flawless. Not a single hard one. 9/10.

AUDIO QUALITY: I don’t have proper home theater gear so I don’t even know if this was 5.1 or 2.0, but it sounded good overall. I noticed saturation distortions in the noisiest moments, but that probably has more to do with my loudspeakers totally sucking than with anything else. The editing is again perfect, with no hard cuts at all. 7/10.

DIFFERENCE TO THE ORIGINAL: It’s way more focused and centered overall. The most offensively cheesy moments are gone (no Saturday Night Fever Pete, no cooking, no landing in front of the American flag, no JJJ pills…). Secondary characters are much less intrusive now: Gwen Stacy is no longer a model, which is much more realistic (let’s face it, Peter Parker may have his charm but is not the kind of guy supermodels drool over), and Eddie Brock has no relationship with her at all (good, everybody being connected to everybody in the original made NY seem like an awfully small place), other characters like Captain Stacy are hardly in the movie (I didn’t mind him but no big loss anyway), and silly moments have been heavily trimmed or completely eliminated all through. The biggest casualty, as I’ve mentioned, is “Sandman shot Uncle Ben”, which was contrived and I’m happy to lose. Overall, this carries a lot less fat and stupid humor. There are laughs left, but they mostly work and are funny (JJJ’s best moments, and the great Bruce Campbell). 9/10.

OVERALL PRESENTATION: This has been made available both as a single layer DVD, which I’m reviewing, and an AVI file. The DVD has a still, silent main menu and scene selection. Not the flashiest or best looking I’ve seen, but it’s all we really need and it achieves its purpose. 6/10.

ENTERTAINMENT: Head and shoulders above the theatrical release. Pacing is consistently good, and annoyance has been removed all through. This has not turned the movie into The Godfather, it hasn’t even turned it into Spider-Man 2, but this is probably as much as it can be done. 9/10.

Badscooter shows genuine talent and a great deal of cinematic intuition in this, his firstling. I might be a little biased in my appreciation because I had a bit of input in the creation process of this edit, but that means I can more clearly see where the stitches are. And right now even myself am having a hard time in spotting them! :smile:

I don’t know if someone who totally hated the theatrical release with a passion will appreciate this one, but IMO fans of the previous two installments will have a version they won’t be ashamed to keep next to part 1 and 2 on their shelves. Overall: 9/10.

Thank you for this edit, Badscooter. It's a huge improvement over the original version.

I recommend this edit to anyone who enjoyed certain elements of Spider-Man 3, but was turned off by its overall goofiness and lame subplots. I love that Sandman doesn't have a personal connection to Peter anymore (the scene where black-suit Spider-Man angrily goes after Sandman and 'kills' him, now comes across as a jealous and ego-inflated Spider-Man going after the guy who beat him in an earlier fight, rather than going after the man who killed his uncle. This actually makes Peter's descent with the symbiote seem much much darker).

I also like that some of Gwen Stacy's stuff was cut out. Her character wasn't done well in this series.

With this edit, I found myself sympathizing with Harry and MJ A LOT more.

And of course, the greatest thing about this edit is that there's no ridiculous montage of Peter being 'bad'.

I thought all the editing was great, and I like the image of MJ that flashed as Peter was in bed and about to be taken by the symbiote. I would have removed the images of Ben Parker though since they seemed to come out of nowhere.

I like the small edits here and there of removing silly one-liner humour...it helped keep me engaged in the drama and action.

And the only thing in this edit that still significantly bothered me was how Peter sort of danced along with the marching band at the ceremony to give Spider-Man the key to the city.

Overall, a great edit that turned an unwatchable movie into a very watchable one.

Review by havok1977 — September 21, 2010 @ 12:51 am

*This rating was given before reviews were required*