Spider-Man: Hero Within

Hot
Updated
 
8.5 (15)
8374 0 1 0 8

User reviews

15 reviews
 
27%
 
73%
5-7 stars
 
0%
3-5 stars
 
0%
1-3 stars
 
0%
Overall rating
 
8.5
Audio/Video Quality
 
9.5(13)
Audio Editing
 
8.7(15)
Visual Editing
 
8.1(15)
Narrative
 
8.1(15)
Enjoyment
 
8.2(15)
Back to Listing
15 results - showing 11 - 15
1 2 3
Ordering
Overall rating
 
7.3
Audio Editing
 
8.0
Visual Editing
 
8.0
Narrative
 
6.0
Enjoyment
 
7.0
An interesting take on the films, seamlessly blended together. Unfortunately, the whole does not equal the sum of the parts – Hero Within is a weaker film than both 1 and 2 (although better than 3!).

It’s an action heavy film, with some great set pieces. Pacing is generally quite good. Editing is technically very well done, as is the sound. Visually and aurally it was excellent.
The structure of the film, the narrative, was quite clear, but the characters didn’t have room to breathe and grow. It was a bit action-movie-ish where the characters are secondary to the plot/set-pieces.

The ultimate problem is too much being packed into one film. Peter’s emotional journey is up and down and up and down. The love story gets abruptly forgotten along the way, and when we finally see MJ again after about 30minutes (in the café) there’s two seconds of dialogue before the action starts again. The love story ended up, therefore, having very little resonance.
The lack of love story also breaks Peter’s arc by removing the primary motivation for him losing his powers. There was very little time for us to see his pain in being apart from MJ.
Further, by losing the voiceover at the end of 1 we don’t ever really understand why Peter can’t be with MJ, which makes the separation aspect artificial.
There was also none of the pain of “Spiderman as menace” which is an additional motivation – and has a payoff in the train rescue.

Hero Within also lacked humour entirely, which I think was a mistake. It made the film overly serious, which doesn’t really fit the tone of Spidey.

On the whole, this was a nice idea, fairly well executed, but ultimately ended up being a decent film, rather than a great one. Spidey 2 is still the go-to film for Spidey fans, but this one is worth a spin just to see the films from a different angle.
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
Overall rating
 
8.8
Audio/Video Quality
 
10.0
Audio Editing
 
8.0
Visual Editing
 
8.0
Narrative
 
9.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
I’ve always liked Sam Raimi’s Spiderman Trilogy. Refreshingly light hearted, well directed and generally very entertaining, they serve as a reminder to film makers making superhero movies today, that not everything needs to be as dark as Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight Trilogy. Spidey 2 is undoubtedly the most impressive in my eyes, but the other two (yes, even the messy third chapter) have their moments too. So, the idea of an edit combining the beginnings of the Spiderman legend from the first movie, with the excellent Spiderman 2 was an exciting one.

Generally, it’s an edit which works very successfully. It breezes along, never outstaying its welcome and at just over 2 hours is a perfect length for this kind of combo edit. The key here for me is how natural the “hand-over” part of the edit feels; by that I simply mean the section when Spiderman 1 ends and Spiderman 2 takes over. I’m pleased to say, that g1orkatos executes it about as well as one could hope for. By having the Spidey 2 footage start after a montage of Parker using his new-found skills for the first time, it appears natural that some time has passed and that some of the characters look slightly different – it’s particularly noticeable for example that MJ has had a change in shade of red hair colour.

Also, the use of the thrilling crane-disaster scene from Spidey 3 works wonderfully well. It took me a moment to realise it didn’t actually come from Spidey 2, so seamlessly was it included into the edit. Excellent work there. Indeed, from a narrative point of view, Hero Within comes off as a huge success. Particularly impressive is the heartfelt material with Peter’s Uncle Ben, which because of the nature of Doc Octopus being a more intimidating and interesting villain that the Green Goblin, has more impact with acting as inspiration and courage for Peter to continue his plight as the webbed crusader. Okay, the romance between him and MJ still comes off a little too “school playground” for my liking, but overall the choices made in the edit to show the blossoming feelings between the two are nicely judged.

Technically g1orkatos also pulls out all the stops. The dual layered DVD version I saw looked great, with some nice subtle colour correction to match Spiderman 1 with the palette from the second film. However, the small amount of footage from Spiderman 3 did stand out a little bit, but I think that’s more to do with Spidey’s suit seeming a little darker. Nothing too distracting however. Audio too is very solid throughout.

So, a perfect edit then? Well, unfortunately not quite. A couple of audio transitions are not as smooth as they could be, which go hand in hand with some visual crossfades which bring a little bit too much attention to themselves. Of particular note is the abrupt fade/cut just as Peter is discovering his powers for the first time on the rooftop. Also worthy of note, is the final shot which hints at the forthcoming sequel. As others have said, it’s too short a scene to serve as the last shot of the actual movie… it would have worked much better as a “Marvel teaser ” at the end of the credits.

Overall however, this is an excellent edit and in truth is a perfect way to see Spiderman 2 as if it had been the first in the series. Bring on the sequel!
L
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
Overall rating
 
8.6
Audio/Video Quality
 
10.0
Audio Editing
 
8.0
Visual Editing
 
7.0
Narrative
 
9.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
Very nice combination of the best parts of Spider-Man 1 (the origin) and 2 (the villain) in the style of the already classic Superman: Son of Jor-El. As would be expected, due to the characteristics of such a project it can never be 100% perfect and a couple of things are implied more than stated, but those are minor and I thought the new narrative worked wonderfully for the most part. I was not bothered at all by the late introduction of Doc Ock, because the origin segment was so entertaining and because it gave this a Superman the Movie flavor, of which it really has the same structure: origin, creation of heroic persona, first heroics, and it's just now when we get to meet the baddie. In this respect, I thought the use of the crane scene from Spider-Man 3 was brilliant, and reminded me a lot of the helicopter scene from Superman. A classic introduction. The scenes from SM1 have also been color corrected to match the look of the sequels, and the result is spot-on.

However, I must say the edit abuses quite a lot of dissolves between scenes. Some have been already pointed out: the most jarring one is the one after Peter first tests his webshooting, and which I have solved by fading to white for a second before fading to Peter arriving home. The one after Doc Ock decides to rebuild his sun project in the warehouse feels quite awkward too. Others are not that bad, and some even work fine, but most of them I felt would have worked better as straight cuts. Some audio transitions aren't quite perfect either: when MJ says "do I get to say thank you" in the upside down kiss scene, the line ends a bit abruptly, and at the very end when it fades to the epilogue there's a bit of stray music. The epilogue, incidentally, I think would have worked better as a post-credits stinger in the style of the Avengers movies, it feels too fast to be a movie finale.

Extras on the DVD are very nice, with two hilarious shorts, a few trailers of goodness to come, and a feature-lenght commentary by g1orkatsos, Neglify, and juice, in which they, in their usual style, talk about a lot of things. Even about the movie sometimes.

I recommend this edit, it's a lot of fun and pretty solid storytelling, but being the obsessive perfectionist (read: nitpicking pain in the a**) that I am, I feel that it falls a bit short of true greatness due to the excess of dissolves.
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
(Updated: May 13, 2013)
Overall rating
 
7.2
Audio/Video Quality
 
9.0
Audio Editing
 
7.0
Visual Editing
 
8.0
Narrative
 
6.0
Enjoyment
 
6.0
this edit for me is both rewarding and frustrating, it's a great idea in combing both spider-man films and for the most part is executed really well. the removal of the goblin as the villain is done brilliantly not once does it effect the edit especially when we get to spider-man 2 and harrys vendetta against spider-man.

i liked the way doc ock isn't introduced until an hour into the film, it gives us the chance to focus more on peter parker and his transformation rather than skipping back and forth from hero to villain. the flow between spider-man 1 to 2 is done well it wasn't obvious that one film had finished and another had began.

however they are many problems i had with the edit one being when doc ock returns to the train. when doc ock announces to mary jane that spider-man is dead my first reaction was when did this happen. given the encounters they've had with one another during the film spider-man wouldn't have been killed by doc ock by hitting him on the head. it would have played out better if doc ock just per-summed spider-man had died when he fled from the train as it was about to crash.

it's one of the main problems i had with the edit as i feel a few scenes weren't warranted, at just over 2hours it felt a little leggy at times. as overs have said the relationship between peter and mary just seems a little off and this is one of the important parts of the edit.

peter making-up with aunt may would have been better if moved to the end, i felt not enough time had lapsed from aunt may being heart broken by peters confession. it would have been a nice way of wrapping up the film

as others have said the inclusion of the spider-man 3 clip didn't work, not because it introduces us to gwen stacy but because it wasn't to long ago that peter parker was struggling to control his web slinging but now he's making a big entrance (almost showing off) i feel it would be best showing spider-man taking out street criminals and build-up to a more confident spider-man.

overall i felt that they was too much plot going on what with him becoming spider-man, having to face off against doc ock and being in love with mary jane. it would have been more challenging to remove the story in which peter loses his powers, for me it over complicates the edit. the first 30mins they are a few transitions that didn't work and i really agree that the film needed humor.

this is an entertaining fanedit but for me the negatives out wayed the positives but given the general favourable reviews and it's fanedit of the month status i know i'm in the minority here.

User Review

Format Watched?
DVD
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
Overall rating
 
7.8
Audio/Video Quality
 
8.0
Audio Editing
 
7.0
Visual Editing
 
7.0
Narrative
 
8.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
This was a brilliant, brilliant fanedit. I loved it! The choices made by the editor and the way the whole thing flowed was superb, IMHO.

If I am to offer some constructive criticism, the colour timing from SM & SM2 are very different to SM3. Personally, I would have tried to re-time the SM & SM2 footage to match the more muted, blueish colour palette of SM3. I also would have moved more of the 'montage' stuff to a bit earlier when Peter first decides to be Spider-Man. Having only the SM3 footage after Spidey makes his choice feels a little short, and yet you do include a montage a bit later that I feel would have worked it a bit better moving it further up. Just personal taste there. I'm sure it's fine as is.

One of the other things I think could be improved (and I'm clutching at straws here) are some of the transistions. If you're going to use a 'fade' then it needs to be rendered a little better or put in a different place or take longer as I noticed it didn't match the fades that Sam Raimi's editors used. The music was sometimes a little off in those transitions too. Perhaps a change of score would help or a audio substitution of some kind.

I really, really liked this edit. And the DVD menu was superb. Excellent edit!
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
15 results - showing 11 - 15
1 2 3