What a reaction!  It's only been 6 days since I put up my Spider-Man review, and I've already had nearly 100 emails pour in (almost one email per million the movie took in during its gargantuan opening weekend).  I'll start with the sane ones and then move into the hostile nutcases who somehow thought I was personally attacking them with my review (wait 'til you see the picture one dedicated fan of the webslinger sent in to me).  There have been some well-written and polite emails that have been sent in from people who didn't agree with my opinion on the movie, but what fun are those?  Fans of The Juicy Cerebellum demand extremes, and I'm not one to argue with the fans (outside of all those times that I do): 

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER!:  A friend of mine dragged me off to Spider-Man again and I ended up thinking it was an okay movie.  Definitely not the "2" I gave it the first time I watched.  Although I still believe the film was a huge rip-off of Superman: The Movie, and could have done much better in the directing and screenplay departments, it was a fairly entertaining plot-hole filled rip-off.  I'd now give it at least a 5.  Possibly as high up as a 6.  Sorry for any grief I may have caused you Spider-Fans.

Dear Juicemaster,
There needs to be more critics online like you.  While I didn't find myself as upset with Spider-Man as you appeared to be I did find the movie to be an overrated superhero flick which didn't add or take away from the film medium.  It wasn't worth the $8.50 I paid to see it nor will I ever voluntarily watch it again.  It wasn't captivating enough to warrant a second viewing and not horrible enough to regret a first.  What I did find captivating and entertaining was your review.  You are a true standout in the field of film criticism!  Not only are you funny, you are in-depth and your directness is invigorating!  You put your ass on the line thrashing a film like this and the film world is all the better for it!  Your reviews (I have went on to read nearly every review you have placed online) exude confidence and honesty.  There are bad movies you love and good movies you hate like all of us "mere mortals".  You don't hide behind the "critic's mask" and don't feel compelled to go along with the mainstream.  As clichéd as it may sound, you are a critic for the people, not the powerful.  Most critics won't admit to liking the occasional American Pie sequel or hating the next Citizen Kane.  It's refreshing to find a critic I can actually believe in even when I don't agree with him.  Keep it up and keep Hollywood on its toes!    
-Jennifer Duplaix

Good GAWD, they're doing another Citizen Kane?  I suppose Rosebud will be computer generated.  (Yes, for those of you with poor sarcasm detectors, I am aware that they aren't actually doing another Citizen Kane film ... just a spin-off about the sled.)

Dear Juicemaster,
Bravo, your review of Spider-man was honest and your points are very valid.  I was disappointed and I tried to avoid the hype.  But I can't imagine you getting too much crap from the hard-core fans because even the hard-core audience HAS to have felt cheated by the lack of an originality that was Raimi's whored out Spider-man.
-Ruben Medina

An unnecessary lack of originality.  All of the ingredients were there to make the movie something special.  I just finished watching the old teaser that played before films last year -- the one with Spider-Man catching the bank robbers in a web he weaved between the Twin Towers -- and it was incredible.  Far more exhilarating than anything we saw in the final film.  Why weren't there more scenes like that?  Give us something original, Raimi!  This could have been the best movie ever made.  I didn't dislike the movie so much for what it was, but rather for all that it wasn't.  I feel that Spider-Man was a "film-by-committee."  A whored-out hero for the cell phone generation.  Sad.  

Dear Juicemaster,
Agree totally, I thought the movie was very cheesy, especially the dialogue.  I didn't expect the dialogue to be that corny, was it intentionally made for children?  The action scenes with Spiderman were fake and the physics were wrong.  The movie is nothing more than another clichéd, commercialized, marketed, and flashy Hollywood junk.
-Rob

It scares me what people are willing to buy into, these days.  Although I wasn't the biggest The Lord of the Rings:  The Fellowship of the Ring fan, I was able to see what people saw in it, even if I didn't get the same thing out of the film as they did (all I really got out of LOTR was over 1,000 pieces of hatemail).  The dialogue in Spider-Man is ludicrous.  If people can tolerate verbal vomit like that spit at them for two horrendously boring hours, why shouldn't Hollywood screenwriters be replaced with monkeys who are willing to tap keys randomly for free?  At this point, I doubt anyone would notice.

Dear Juicemaster,
Christ, what have they done to my hero? Your analogy to Smallville was exactly what I was thinking. That SHOW is real. It has good writing. It is a believable life Superman could live. This is something sorely missed from the piece of celluloid some people choose to refer to as ‘Spider-Man’. The Green Goblin looked, and talked like a guy from power rangers. Mary Jane’s character was not very good, she was just a stupid ditz. In the comics, she was intelligent and witty. Harry and Norman Osborn sucked. Willem Dafoe does not know how to act in this movie. His character was SO overacted it was disgusting. And Harry? That Franco kid playing him blows. His acting belongs back in that stupid movie of which I cant remember the name in which I first saw him.  Even Tobey. Reeve WAS Superman. Keaton WAS Batman. Jackman WAS Wolverine. Maguire WAS….an actor. Then again, can I really blame him? No actor could have pulled off a convincing performance with those lines. Dear god, how did anybody watching that movie let them get away with that? The Goblin saying: “You’ve spun your last web Spider-Man” goes on in the comics all the time. There it's good. Even in a movie it could be good, if they used it right. But they screwed it up. I cannot convey my utter disappointment at this movie, and at every reviewer that said it was ‘The best since Batman or Superman’.  I own more than half the Amazing Spider-Man line of comics. I have all the Spider-Man games (even though most suck), I have lots of the toys. I have been a fan since I was 10. Last night, was the first and only time I can ever remember that I was ashamed to consider myself a Spider-Man fan. 
-Curtis

Did I just find somebody who liked Spider-Man less than me?  I'm guessing the movie you're thinking of with James Franco was the made-for-television film, James Dean.  I believe he actually won an award of some sort for his performance in that.  He better treasure it, because it's the last one he's going to get.  His James Dean portrayal was obviously nothing more than him acting like himself.  I've seen this guy in interviews, and in movies, and he always seems completely out of it.  Like the Beatniks of yesteryear, only wealthier and witless.  Can't someone get this man some friggin' caffeine and a little charisma?  The scariest thing is to think that, if they go along with the comics, which they won't, he actually turns into The Green Goblin.  G-ZUZ!  If you thought Willem Dafoe was bad in Spider-Man, which he was, think what James Franco will be like playing the same character in the sequel!  Kirsten Dunst did the best she could with what she was given, but she wasn't given anything worth writing home about.  Her character was underused to the point of sexism.  Sure, geeks don't really like looking at women as much as guys in spandex, but Mary Jane is an excellent character in the comic, and Dunst seemed more than willing to give it her all.  Again, I go back to all that Spider-Man could have been, and all that it wasn't.  The full title of this film should read, Spider-Man:  Wasted Potential.

Dear Juicemaster, 
What gives you the right to go against popular opinion?  If you go on this way we could finally find a believable critic and that would change the tides, melt the ice caps and bring the world to a sudden, violent end in a way that would make even George W. jealous.  You didn't like a movie that your fellow critics did and you admitted it?!?  This isn't right!  I just felt my room shake.  Is the sky turning red?  Oh wait it's the rose-colored glasses I've been wearing.  Thanks for having the guts to tell it like it is.  Your opinion is your opinion and your reviews are the best out there.  I've disagreed with you numerous times but never got angry.  I do agree with you on Spider-Man.  It was pitiful in all that it stole from.  Good luck with the hate mail!  I'm sure you'll be getting lots of it!  
-Candace McKnight

Yes, hatemail I received (why am I talking like Yoda?).  Thanks for your email, it was a nice segue into the nasty letters sent from angry Spider-Fans everywhere ...

Dear Webmaster,
You make me fucking sick.  You trash a great movie.  This isn't worth my fucking time.  Fuck You Gay Ass monkey FUCKER!!!!!
-Vincent

I wonder what would happen if I really started fucking monkeys?  Maybe they could hook me up with Hollywood's hottest screenwriters.  I could befriend simians and write the new Fantastic Four picture!  Here's the pre-credit narration:  "A;LKDGJAIGH;JBKAJEPOTIQUNBN L;;LKAG GJDAGKLAJGAJ; JGADGJHIOEKQJ."  That should bring in about 150 million on opening weekend.  The critics will say, "it wasn't life-changing, but it was the best popcorn flick in years!  In particular, I enjoyed the exchange between the Thing and Mr. Fantastic.  The Thing made a good point by saying, 'agadg ajkdg gppq,' but Mr. Fantastic's response of 'nzg apq vaaz' was a real zinger!"

Hey Moron,
You wouldn't know a good flick if it ass f**ked you...
-Michael

H*y d*psh*t; y*u wo**dn't kn*w h*w to wr**e a g**d pi*ce of hatem**l if yo*r p*odle g*ve y*u a rimj*b!

Dear Juicemaster,
Spider-Man was a riff on the original Superman theme. The echoes of the man of steel were intentional. To blame the filmmakers for these clearly acknowledged repititions reveals that you don't know what you are talking about and that should not be reviewing a film that you do not understand. I will find a critic who actually knows something about the movies he reviews, rather than a subhuman wanker boy who doesn't know what he is looking at. Fuck you, wanker boy.  Just wait, Krypton-boy, I'm sure that a silly Smallville movie is right on the horizon.
-Matt Benzing 

Being that Alfred Gough and Miles Miller -- the two minds behind Smallville -- are set to write next year's Spider-Man 2, I may get it sooner than you expected.  I just wonder how "silly" it will be when the Krypton-boy's are suddenly the ones putting words into your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man's mouth?  If I were you, which I'm glad I'm not, I'd get to the hospital and ask the doctor to pull that foot out of your big mouth.  And intentionally "riffing" on Superman makes the rip-off any better, how?

Note:  some other Matt Benzing was searching for his own name in a search engine one day and found the Matt Benzing letter up above and wanted me to let people know that the Matt Benzing above is not the uptight librarian from Rensselaer.

Dear Juicemaster,
You fucking failure piece of non-aborted waste. If you slam the webslinger again I'll personally fucking kill you and I know your address!
-Anonymous

Well, I know your name!  It's "Anonymous."  So there!

And finally, this picture sent in from one of the Spider-Fans (for the record, I really do enjoy the character of Spider-Man, I just didn't like the movie very much), sums the whole thing up.  

They say a picture speaks a thousand words.  This one only speaks two, but I bet you can figure out which two they are:

Hey! Reading other people's mail makes me feel all dirty inside, and I kinda like it. Send me to The Ultimate Letter Archive!

Wanna write to The Juicemaster?  Got something important to say (or something completely stupid)? Send email to: alex@juicycerebellum.com

Back to the juicy cerebellum