Spider-Man

For today’s Lockdown Rewatch, Sam Raimi brought his love of the boy-arachnid to the big screen with great stunts and groundbreaking VFX, a decent story and excellent performances in 2002’s Spider-Man. Willem Dafoe (who was scarier out of costume as the mentally disintegrating Harry Osborn)  as Green Goblin and JK Simmons (who has become the definitive J. Jonah Jameson… just ask Tom Holland) chew up the scenery and helped make the film an instant superhero classic – it was the first film ever to bank $100 million in its opening weekend. Spider-Man tells the story of… let’s be honest, you already know the story…

But did you know…

1) James Cameron had worked on a treatment for Carolco Pictures, which had the approval of Spider-Man creator Stan Lee, who praised it for honoring the beloved character but still feeling “fresh and new”. In the mid 1990’s Carolco went bankrupt and Sony purchased the rights, which included some of Cameron’s material. Some aspects of his treatment made it into the final film, including making Spider-Man’s webbing organic (in the comics they were manufactured by Parker).

2) In this clip Peter tries out his web slinging abilities, and tries to activate them through hand gestures and different catchphrases, including “up, up and away” and “Shazam!” – both of which are plays on DC Comic’s characters Superman and Shazam. These lines were actually not scripted, and throughout the film Raimi encouraged Maguire to take the lead on the specifics of his dialogue. 

3) The first teaser for the film premiered during the summer of 2001, and features Spider-Man catching a helicopter filled with bank robbers by trapping the aircraft in a net spun between the twin towers of the World Trade Center. Following the 9/11 attacks, Sony had to pull the trailer as well as all marketing materials depicting the towers. 

4) Hugh Jackman agreed to a brief cameo as Wolverine. Jackman’s scene was shelved at the last moment because the production couldn’t get access to the Wolverine costume from X-Men (2000).