bosef982
Superhero
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stillanerd said:Don't misunderstand, Dragon, it's quite apparent that we are supposed to see Sandman as the bad guy. However, the very notion that the filmmakers have chosen to give him a sick daughter and that he's originally committing crimes to get money to pay for medical bills and what not does give him a degree of sympathy, sort of a watered-down version Jean Valljean. And if he has a sick child that needs to be cured, well he may have the attitude that he's not going to let anything stand in his way to ensure the life of his child, which of course blinds him to the actions he in fact that he is the bad guy, much like Spidey will be blinded by his own personal revenge against him. And if he's actually innocent of the murder of Uncle Ben, that serves to add to this, in that he ironically becomes the very thing he was falsely accused of. Also, Raimi, in the past two films, didn't make the villain totally unsympathetic either while at the same time clearly made them villains.
That's a good point. Like I said, earlier somewhere, I understand what Raimi is apparently trying to do. And there is an argument for saying that even though Marko may be the real killer, he's still an accomplice of the thief/carjacker and that if Spidey had caught the theif/carjacker then Marko wouldn't have had to kill Uncle Ben in order to steal the car. However, this still dimishes the idea that Peter let go of the very person who ended up killing his uncle, thus making his choice to fight crime a far more personal, guilt-driven, and realistic and complex motivation, which is what Stan Lee was striving for. Besides, if Sandman turns out to not have pulled the trigger, he's still, under the law, just as guilty as the guy who pulled the trigger because he was an accomplice in the robbery/carjacking. Course, you could say the same thing about carjacker as well, but then again why bother complicating matters.
Not necessarily. If Sandman did not kill Uncle Ben, but Peter, convinced by the evidence against him, blinded by his need to avenge his uncle, and the suit feeding those emotions, takes his vengence out on Sandman, it would make it all the worse because his desire for revenge blinded him of the truth, which is what revenge does. In turn, if Sandman survives the attack on him by black-costumed Spidey, this would ironically, moreso than being caught in the particle accelerator, make him into the very monster Spidey mistakeningly thought he was because of his desire for paypack against Spidey. It would also tie-in well with Eddie Brock's growing resentment towards Peter when he becomes Venom in that he wants revenge against Peter for moving in on Gwen when, in actuality, Peter still loves MJ and the suit was only fueling Peter's supefical attraction for Gwen. Not to mention Harry's desire for revenge against Peter for his belief that Peter killed his father, when of course we know he did not. Again, these two storylines, plus the Spider-Man vs. Sandman one would illustrate the common theme: revenge is not only wrong, it blinds people to the truth.
Wow, people have brains on SHH. Everyone once and a while you find one

But yes, this does seem to be the natural synthesis of the themes of this movie -- it also makes the climax of this film a bit more thematic then previous movies in that Peter must confront the offspring of his vengeance and must, fittingly, seek the help of Harry in order to win. The symmetry lines up quite well.