if Raimi thinks the problem was too many villans, then he is doomed to repeat his mistake. The movie sucked cause
1. Parkers character was ridiculous in the movie.
2. Topher Grace, all i saw was eric foreman.

The Movie sucked because the Science Fiction elements weren't intelligently done. They were just thrown at the wall to see if they would stick.

They didn't

Thats the reason actors get typecast. Topher is a good actor and did a good job playing a sniveling little creep!!

When is everyone going to acknowledge that Raimi's Spider-Man is the equivalant of Burton's Batman. It's hokey, with over the top acting and goofy villians.

Tobey Macguire is a horrible Spidey. One of greatest traits of Spider-Man is his sense of humor. Listening to him crack jokes as he takes out a villain is essential to making a true Spider-Man movie. Unfortunately, Tobey is inccapable of pulling it off and Raimi has totally removed if from the character.

Hire a director who will do to Spidey what Nolan did to Batman and an actor who can pull off the character with even an ounce of the comics charm and then you'll have a true Spider-Man movie.

Justin Long or Chris Evans would both be vast improvements over Seabiscuit's Backpack.

I'll see your Justin Long and raise you a Michael Cera. I think Cera's one of a handful of young actors who can handle the quips without sounding hokey or cheesy. That said, I like Tobey as Parker and Raimi's one of my favorite all-time directors. The studio needs to stay out of his hair and let him do his thing.

Raimi shouldn't be too hard on himself. The first two Spider-Man movies were terrific, and he certainly has done numerous other excellent films. So Spidey 3 was a mess (and watching it again just recently on cable affirmed that for me); live and learn, Sam.

Now, if Spidey 4 sucks, too... well...

As long as it doesn't have a stupid villain like the second one then I'll like it. And when the third one came out EVERYONE on the internet loved it. People just are too stupid to make up their mind.

FIRE_ RAIMI you hit the nail on the head. I have not been happy with any of the Spidey movies so far. Yes they do have some entertaining elements but they could be much better and true to the original charactor. I will got to see number 4 but I'm afraid I will be disappointed yet again!

Avi Arad is the producer to blame. This guy runs the Marvel film division and should be fired from Disney. He forced Raimi to crowbar in Venom. Thus ruining the film. He greenlights some real garbage. Ghost Rider comes to mind along with Daredevil. He needs to go. Also, Mary Jane is supposed to be hot. Kirsten Dunst is fugly. Tobey McGuire is a great Spider-Man. He proves that a character is only as great as the writing. Michael Cera looks like a Goomba from the Mario Bros. movie. Justin Long is too old for the part.

Tobey Maguire is 3 years older than Justin Long. Not that I thnk Justin Long is good for the part, just that your facts were wrong. As far as casting Maguire is fine, Dunst is fine, the script for 3 was just overwrought with problems. Mysterio should be the villian.

The comic book Peter Parker was my first crush, I love a guy with snark. The movies haven't done him justice at all, but I'm not sure I blame Tobey Maguire. Kirsten Dunst, however seems to fully embrace MJ as a bland, whiny twit.

When I said too old, I meant he looks too old. There's my facts.

it always seem like when they put to many villains in a movie it doesn't work.instead of just focusing on just one

Methinks Sam doth protest too little.

The Spiderman movies have sucked since the first one, and if all he can think to apologize for is squeezing Venom into 3 because "Marvel made him do it..." then he shouldn't even consider doing 4, because he just doesn't get it.

i know some fans who still argue over whether spiderman should have organic web shooters or man made.yes i think they did try to do to much with spidey 3.and yes the green goblin looked like a power ranger villain.but if spiderman 1 tanked then would we have all these comic book movies at all?of course some are better than others.but generally there ok.or at least the bad ones are few.ie the first hulk and electra.even the first fantastic four was at least watchable.so lets hope sam pays more attention this time with the next spiderman movies.and spidey 3 was just a blip.like Aron Ecard said about the dark knight.the first on was so good you diden't want to be in the one that sucked.plus kids don't read like they use to.so it's the 30 and 40 year old geeks like me who are the one's still buying comics.so they need the movie money to help keep going

Too many villains weren't the problem with Spiderman 3. It is the way they were incorporated. You can't just breeze through Venom's story line. They should have cut out the story line with Gwen that did not add to the picture and spent the time developing the villains.

However, the best bet would have been to just introduce Venom at the end of Spiderman 3 and instead show off more of Spiderman's enhanced powers in the black suit.

For Spiderman 4 they could have more than one Villain. The way they can do it is have 1 main villain. Then just have the sub villains that are good but might be able to carry a whole movie. Maybe begin the movie with Spidey stopping a crime being done by Shocker, Rhino, Vulture or Beetle. That character will get locked up and that's it.

Then build the story on the main villain. They also need to get Mary Jane back together with parker.

Black Kat would have been a better character to introduce in Spiderman 3 to develop a love triangle with than Gwen.

Was Spiderman 3 the best film of the trilogy? No. Was it the unwatchable piece of crap so many people make it out to be? No. Not by a long shot.

I can't tell if people's standards are too high, or if people just like to tear things apart. In any case, I avoided seeing Spiderman 3 because I heard such uniform hate towards it. Finally got around to seeing it and it was a fun movie. Had no problem with it other than it could have been a bit longer to flesh out the multiple story-arcs better. It wasn't as serious necessarily as the previous two films, but it was FUN. And I think fun is something that is looked down upon by the fan community. I think people just prefer dark and intense.

Anyway, bring back Gwen Stacy. I wanted Peter to live MJ for her.

since when is Eddie Brock a LITTLE sniviling creep?? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddie_Brock

The next Spider-Man film (however and with whomever) needs to have spidey quipping with really well written snappy-patter... and for God's sake... give him a backbone. That does not mean we shouldn't see him fail a time or two. By all means, every good Sidey story I know has him having his ass handed too him, then to only bounce back with resiliant grace and confidence. Please, no more emo spider-man!!!

Ok..let me preface this by saying that in NO means did i think Spiderman 3 was a gem, it certainly had it's flaws. But it wasn't a bad film either. Yes, they rushed the Venom character, they could have saved him for an entire movie in #4. They should have concentrated on Sandman as the main villain and digging deeper into Peter and Harry's feud, saving what happened at the end of 3 until the end of 4, thus bringing back a very talented James Franco for a 4th film. I agree with giving Peter Parker more of a backbone as far as him accepting being Spiderman. Quite frankly they could plug any actress into MJ's role because the way the character is written is so wishy washy I don't think anyone could give it depth.

And finally...on a side note...and again let me preface this by saying I enjoyed the film...I wish people would quit giving "The Dark Knight" such a verbal BJ. It was a decent film, not a fantastic one. Sorry, Christian Bale doesn't do it for me, and before anyone starts, I saw Dark Knight before his freak out on the set of Terminator. When he's Batman and he's talking he sounds like Sgt Slaughter with asthma. I find it funny how everyone bitches about how little time was spent on Venom in SM3, yet these same people hail Dark Knight as "The greatest superhero movie ever made" Exactly how long was Two Face in Dark Knight? Talk about misuse of an iconic villian. And don't bother arguing box office numbers because although no one wants to admit it, had Heath Ledger not died, the numbers would have been a bit lower. I personally know QUITE a few people (most of them women who don't even read comics) who saw it that didn't even know Christian Bale had done Batman Begins. I'm sure the number is even higher than the people i personally know.

And finally...before the fanboys grow fangs, Heath Ledger was AWESOME in Dark Knight and one of the many tragedies in his death is that we'll never get to see that performance again.

I liked cylon_conspiracy and TattsDeej comments.

People who watched Spiderman 3 wanted the movie to be longer so that it would have more Venom. People who watched Dark Knight wanted the movie to be shorter. The whole Two-face character was done poorly.

The 1 way in which Spiderman 3 definitely beat Dark Knight is that in the last half hour people were still awake and enjoying the movie. In the last half hour of Dark Knight people were wondering when is the movie going to end.

Still I think Dark Knight was a good movie just not as good as some people say it was.

I think the biggest problem with Spiderman 3 was that the director Sam Raimi was not familiar with the Venom character. It seems Venom was after his comic reading time. He was more familiar with Sandman which is why he did a great job of portraying Sandman on the screen. It was the Venom storyline that needed to be lengthened and improved.

Sam Raimi is a great director in my book.

Also Hollywood and fans need to realize that darker doesn't always mean better. For Batman it makes sense for the movie to have a dark feel to it. For Spiderman it does not.

Spider-man 3 was enjoyable to watch but ultimately a let down.

From the first movie, the conflict of 'Peter versus Harry over Mary Jane' has been brewing. The third movie was clearly supposed to be the two of them fighting at first but being forced to put aside their differences to defeat the more powerful Sandman, thus realizing that they shouldn't be fighting and they should be friends.

Shoehorning Venom into the third movie completely derailed the overall arc of the movie trilogy. He NEVER should have been put in the film-it totally ruined what Raimi was trying to build from the first.

Venom's a crap villain. Unfortunately, he's popular so I have to live with him as part of the Spidey mythos.

I totally agree with the sentiment that Spidey doesn't get to crack wise nearly enough in the Raimi movies. Spidey's supposed to be a motor mouth, constantly insulting the villains. Tobey's a fine actor and I'm confident that he could pull off more wisecracks if they would just write those lines for him.

Kirsten Dunst was awesome as Mary Jane when everyone was in high school. But later, as the characters got older I found her less and less appealing. She's Mary Jane now though, at least until they recast everyone, so we're stuck with her. I just want Mary Jane to be the girl she was in great comics like Spider-Man: Blue-the girl you can't help but fall totally in love with.

In my opinion, the only two characters that they got COMPLETELY right for the Spidey movies from the standpoint of embodying the core values of the comic versions are J. Jonah Jameson and Aunt May. Everyone else is an interpretation of the original, a compromise. The results are mixed.

But the Spidey movies have all been entertaining films. I can't deny that. But to say that they're perfect theatrical versions would be stretching it. I own all 3 on DVD and am happy to have them, but they are not at all perfect. There are problems, and these problems can be fixed.

Go back to 1 villain and focus on the things that make Spider-Man so much fun to read: bad luck, confidence issues, a difficult civilian existence and relationship problems with impossibly hot women.

Hopefully not too many villains this time. if they were to throw in multiple villains I like the idea of kicking things off like a Bond or Indiana Jones movie with an action show peice at the start that is only peripherally related to the movies plot - or perhaps to kick off the tone.

Call me if I'm wrong, but the Lizard has a logical tie in to kids (conners son was always a major motivator for connor). Kids is often a bad place to go with an action / superhero movie, although if Raimi is exploring Spiderman's evolution - maybe he'll have spidey question his future with MJ.

I reckon Raimi could also play around with the theme of Parker being a zero in real life (stuck in a rut) and Spidey being a hero, perhaps with MJ's life taking off and the jealousy this entails - although this moves into the "spiderman no more" theme of number 2. To be honest though this is the pervading theme of most of spider man comics and should probably be part of the story.

Perhaps the theme will be "grey" - throw in Flash Thompson as a friedn and the Black cat as a maybe baddy and maybe goody and blur the lines of where spidey sits?