Seven Reasons I hated "Spider-Man 3"

(1) If it was an end-of-an-era type feeling to see James Bond brooding over his love in Casino Royale, watching Spider-Man going through similar early-20's love-crisis was a pathetic waste of precious weekend time. Superheroes exist because they tickle the 14-year olds inside us, not because we want to them to show how to make it up with our bitter girlfriends. Spider-Man was so burdened with relationship crisis that I wondered whether I was watching another episode of "Sex in the City" with characters wearing funny suits they cannot go to bathroom wearing!

Producers, please don't make the icons human. It would absolutely hurt to see James Bond visiting a dentist for Root Canal (even though he eventually roots for her canal!). It sucks to see Spider-Man, too, is scared of his girlfriend's mood swings!

(2) Just because it is the third movie in the series does not mean we needed THREE villains. It reminded me of old Bollywood days when even an Amitabh Bachchan could not guarantee success without one or some of Shatrughan, Rishi Kapoor, Vinod Khanna etc.

Villain number one - Sandman - you can blow away but you can never kill. Two, a pissed off co-worker from 'Daily Bugle' infected with an extra-terrestrial black "venom" that 'multiplies one's aggression' . It's something like a Viagra for Violence. We call that chemical "testosterone" in this planet! Three, Spidey's best pal when he's amnesiac, worst enemy when he remembers - "New Goblin".

The climax involves a foursome over a tied and hung-from-200-feet Kirsten Dunst.

(3) Wait! These three super-villains are basically good people. Sandman robs for his sick daughter, "Venom" does it because Spidey flirts with his oh-so-hot girlfriend, and the other does it because he thinks Spidey killed his father.

What happened to plain old bad characters who are evil because they like it that way? Hannibal Lecter, for example. When was the last time a villain you like had to justify why he chose to do what he does?

(4) The action sequences look straight out of a highly predictable video game. Except the scene where "sandman" is born - because of a particle physics experiment gone wrong - none other can halt that mid-day yawn.

(5) Mary Jane is the "career comparer" type girlfriend that a guy should highly avoid. I understand feminism and all, but you don't do that if you're a superhero's girlfriend, sing really bad and choose Broadway as your career! I am not anti-feminist, trust me. I never heard Prince Philip - Queen Elizabeth's husband - complaining at all about whatever he does for living.

Oh, and if an actress is paid $10 million for a mainstream movie glamor role, I would expect her to wax! The web on her hand had nothing to do with the title of the movie.

(6) Like the Indian state-run television forced me to watch Rajiv Gandhi for at least an hour a day in the early 80s, Hollywood forced practically everyone out to watch movie the last weekend to "Spider-Man 3". Just in India Sony released 700 prints for Spidey 3! In my local Century 16-theaters, there were at least 12 shows a day during the weekend.

Present day movie marketing demands a high number of prints to fight off piracy and to recoup most of the investment as early as possible. They just flood the market with so many prints that bootleggers cannot mark any profit. That said, releasing this movie to about 5000 screens in US itself is a record just like its $150m collection in the first weekend.

What's next? Running out of theaters to release, would they start showing the movies on the billboards?

(7) In India, this was dubbed in Hindi, Tamil, Telugu *and* Bhojpuri ("Maakad Manav")! Toby Maguire meets Ravi Kishen. Kirsten Dunst meets Nagma.

Imagine Spidey wooing MJ -- after that semi-bitter fight -- a-la-Bhojpur style -



While on Bhojpuri, one Mr. Jupiter Babu came up with a perfect 'review' on Spider-Man 3 --

"Bhaaya aisa kya hain makda admi me? Hum makda to dekh nahi sakte uskoo mar mar ke ghar se nikal dete hain ye sasura spiderman kahen dekhat ho bhai, isse achha baag me sair karon health banao, bachhon ko rizane ke totke hain ye Spiderman, Tarzan, Phantom, Chacha Chaudhari, Billu, Pinki, Gabdu padho aur dekho. Foreign ka Superman, Spiderman choDon, "Tara Rum Pum" dekho, ok, yaad rakhna bhulna nahin bhai log".

Lalu Prasad Yadav is way more entertaining on any day than Toby Maguire's Spider-Man.