Agreed, but I still argue that this movie is more faithful than the previous trilogy, origin changes aside.
It just feels much more like the Spider-Man I'm familiar with. Raimi's Spidey was very much stuck in the 60's, which is fine I guess if you're into that era. He obviously grew up with it so I can't really fault him for wanting to pull his character out of there. But the problem with that was the fact that Peter had been out of his dopey teenager stage for over 50 years in the comics. Ever since I was a kid, Peter Parker was very cool, calm and collected. He was always sure of himself. Sure he was down on his luck and a bit nerdy, but those have always been his mainstays. Raimi's Peter was a socially awkward dope who looked and acted like an old-timey school boy. It's not 1960 Sam Raimi! Peter has very much evolved since then. I can understand wanting to pull inspiration from what you grew up with, but even the kid audience of SM1 (I believe I was about 12 or 13 at the time) had grown up with the Spider-Man animated series and at least 20 years worth of comics that have portrayed Spidey as a mature adult who was actually a pretty cool guy. He also had tons of Spider gadgets and lots of know-how when it came to the superhero biz.
Now take Webb's version. This Peter Parker is very much based on his Ultimate counterpart, which as we all know is a very recent and updated iteration of the character. And it's probably the most appropriate to pull from because all Ultimate Spidey focused on was the teenage Peter Parker, and it was pulled off quite excellently I might add. If you ask me, this is far more appropriate to do with a character like Spider-Man who has been around for over 60 years. If you want to appeal to a young crowd, or even a more modern crowd for that matter, don't pull a kid out of the 60's and throw him into the 21st century. Use a kid from that era with real world problems facing real world situations that many of us face. Have him respond how people today would respond and act like people today act. It also doesn't hurt that they are diving into the scientific genius side of Peter Parker, something Raimi barely touched on in favor of a love triangle.
Raimi did capture a Spider-Man that was faithful to his comic roots, but sadly he was about 50 years too late, and this is why he doesn't resonate with me. I just didn't grow up with him and quite frankly I have a hard time taking him seriously. I'm grateful for what Raimi did for the genre, but I haven't been interested in his take on Spidey for some time now. It's very refreshing for me to see Webb take this property, update it, and still keep the core of the character intact. I'm really excited to see how it all plays out.
