Here's How Sam Raimi Really Felt About His Most-Hated Spider-Man Movie
Tobey Maguire's Spider-Man trilogy director regretted caving in to Sony producers' demands.
Spider-Man 3 has become the conclusion of Sam Raimi 's trilogy about the friendly neighborhood superhero.
Though the first two movies of the trilogy were universally loved, the third and the most expensive one was widely deemed the weakest installment of the franchise.
The majority of haters criticized the movie for some of its storylines, out-of-character scenes, and an excessive number of villains. Even the director of the movie revealed he thought Spider-Man 3 was "awful."
"I messed up with that third Spider-Man. People hated me for years. They still hate me for it," Sam Raimi said during the Nerdist podcast discussion of the movie (via Gizmodo). "It's a movie that just didn't work very well."
The director added that he hadn't believed in all the characters, clearly hinting at one of the villains forced on him. Originally, Raimi wanted to feature two antagonists, Harry Osborn and Sandman. However, producer Avi Arad insisted on cramming in Venom because Sony wanted to spin the supervillain off into a solo movie.
"If the director doesn't love something, it's wrong of them to make it when so many other people love it," Raimi added. "I should've just stuck with the characters and the relationships and progressed them to the next step and not tried to top the bar. I think that was my mistake."
The podcast host tried to sweeten the pill by saying "bad" was not the right word to describe Spider-Man 3 after Raimi told him, "directors don't like to talk about their bad films." But Raimi was adamant. "Awful!" he exclaimed in reply.
Such a negative review sounds a bit harsh coming from the creator. He clearly didn't like Sony tweaking his screenplay. No wonder Raimi eventually bailed on Spider-Man 4, and all the planned installments were canceled.
However, over time, the trilogy has gained the status of a cultural phenomenon beloved by millions of fans. Since 2007, when the threequel premiered, the audience's opinion about Spider-Man 3 seems to have changed. Some fans actually consider the movie to be the best of the trilogy. The majority agree that it was underrated and judged harshly at the time of its release.
Now many think that despite its flaws, Spider-Man 3 was the perfect send-off to the franchise. Peter beat the personification of his inner demons, got forgiveness from his best friend, and had true closure for Uncle Ben's death.