I wish we could have seen him web up his own face after his mask was destroyed just like he had done many times in the comics. Or if not that scene maybe have him confront Jameson wearing a web mask while getting his uniform back. There could have been some banter and "zip" out the window he goes.

Andrew Hilsmann wrote: Lee & Ditko's The Amazing Spider-Man #7, pages 7-8. Read it and weep. Maybe saving John Jameson's space capsule would have made for a more convincing film. I enjoyed the movie, and most of the problems I had with it were the result of all the bad decisions of the first one, with the exception of the dumb unmasking scene. On again, off again powers are a staple of Marvel comics dating back to the 60s. Frank Miller used it during his run on Daredevil. Did it make for a bad story there?

On again, off again is fine, as long as it's used intelligently. IMO, the filmmakers having Peter fall 20 stories after his powers cut out is not smart. Oh, wait, he's still invulnerable. But his powers just cut out. Which is it?

But why would his powers cutting out affect his web glands, that respond to a muscle contraction? That is not smart to me either.

Daredevil losing his hypersensitivity is a lot more believable to me.

Brendan Howard wrote:   I'm almost always willing to watch a film that has been overwhelmingly popular so I can have an opinion about it. Sometimes I am impressed (never saw GOODFELLAS until last year, and wow!) and sometimes I am puzzled (opposite reaction for SCENT OF A WOMAN).

To change the subject a little, here is my Scent of A Woman story.

So I decided to go rent a movie at one of those big chain video stores (I think it was Blockbuster) and walk up to the kid behind the counter. I ask him, "Do you have the movie 'Scent of A Woman'?" He looks at me like I'm an idiot and says, "I'm sorry sir, we don't carry those types of movies." Right next to him is the manager and he says, "No you moron! He's talking about the Al Pacino movie. You know, HOO-HAH!"

I will disagree with this.
According to Rotten Tomatoes.com, 94% of critics gave Superman 1 a positive review, as opposed to 86% for Superman 2.
According to imdb.com, the average review for Superman was 7.1 (far too low, I know, I know), while the average review for Superman 2 was 6.5.

As for your opinion on Spider-Man 2, I will also have to disagree. It was simply one of my favorite movies to come out in the last year.

Thomas, John is talking about reviews at the time of the movie's release.  If I'm not mistaken, both Rotten Tomatoes and IMDb garner "reviews" mainly from user input.  Rotten Tomatoes also includes professional reviews gathered from major newspapers and television critics.  SUPERMAN and SUPERMAN II were around long before the internet and user reviews. As such, he's talking about the reviews of those movies as written 27 and 25 years ago, respectively, and not a website where current positive user reviews can pump up a "fresh" rating.  John's point stands.

I didn't say I found the story believable, as I've never read it. I was referring to the idea of Daredevil losing his senses as more believable. And I said I have no problem with on again, off again, if it's done intelligently. Did Miller write an intelligent story? If he did, then by 'my line of reasoning', I can believe in it.

My problem with the Spider-Man movie is the loss of his powers, coupled with the loss in function of these biological structures. Okay, I can see his period of psychosomatic-ness affecting his powers. By your example of impotence, I can almost by it affecting his web glands (giants p-nises), but he twitches his hand a certain way and the webbing shoots out. Easy as that.

But upthread I mentioned the hairs on his hands that allow him to wall-crawl (through his gloves!). Does a psychosomatic illness affect these hairs now? Did they fall out and regrow? That's the big part that isn't intelligent to me.

Of course I can suspend belief. I wouldn't be reading comic books as long as I have if I couldn't. But suspension can only go so far with me. Don't we toss around the word verisimilitude around here?

We do indeed but there is no commonly agreed ground about what constitutes verisimilitude, which part of our disbelief we are willing to suspend, etc. 

It depends on you. 

The implication that there is something wrong with someone whose personal line is different to ones own, that does crop up here from time to time, is what leads to the disagreements.  Many of those disagreements make for interesting and stimulating debate, but there is no 'right or wrong' on either side here and we would do well to remember that from time to time.  FWIW I think that the 'there are some things that I am willing to suspend disbelief on but others on which I am not' is a precarious position from which to present any persuasive point

I know that the common belief around Omaha, Nebraska at the time SUPERMAN II was released was that it was better than the first movie in every way. The sequel was "action-packed" while the first was "boring."