Yahoo Movies Gwen Stacy's death in The Amazing Spider-Man 2 was ballsy movie making
2014's Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone Spider-sequel didn't quite live up to its billing, but one moment stands it apart from all other Marvel movies.
2014's The Amazing Spider-Man 2 didn't really live up to its title. There was a "Spider-Man" in it, yes, and it's true that this was the second film in Andrew Garfield's era as Peter Parker. But to call it "Amazing" was more of a stretch than if you tried to wear Spidey's spandex on pizza night.
Directed by (the improbably named) Marc Webb, this sequel spun a mess of a story that tried to pull too many threads together at once. The one thread actually worth hanging onto throughout all this was the chemistry Garfield shared with his girlfriend at the time, Emma Stone, who played Spidey's love interest, Gwen Stacy. It's a shame Spider-Man couldn't hold onto Gwen fast enough at the end though.
In a climactic battle, The Green Goblin threw Emma Stone's character through the top of a clock tower. So far, so good, because that's par for the course in superheroing, right? Superpowered boy meets girl. Girl becomes hostage. Superpowered boy saves girl. It's a tale as old as time, if slightly sexist. Except after Spidey saved Gwen, Harry Osborn's goblin glider smashed into the clock tower, sending her into freefall.
Spider-Man saves her again, this time with his webbing, but then turning clock gears cut his web just as the Green Goblin attacks again. By the time that's been dealt with, there's almost no time left to save Gwen. Spider-Man tries, of course, shooting out another web to save her. She'll be fine, right? It's Gwen.
That's what casual cinemagoers must have thought watching this at the time. Because who in their right mind would kill off the leading lady of a huge superhero blockbuster such as this? It would be like killing Lois Lane or Pepper Potts or heck, even Spidey's own Mary-Jane Watson. But comic book fans knew better…
It's at this point Webb ups the ante with a slow-motion web shoot. As Gwen falls and Spider-Man struggles to reach the love of his life, the web unfurls like a hand stretching out towards her. He wants to save her so much that this extension of his body, his entire essence, is reaching out too. It's a poetic moment for the franchise akin to Sandman's "birth" in Spider-Man 3, one where the gorgeous visuals add even more pathos to such an emotionally-charged scene.
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And it's going to be even more emotional when Spidey saves Gwen just in the nick of time. Never mind that she keeps falling and the web's taking forever and Peter's starting to panic. Because then it all works out when the web catches up and snags Gwen just a second before she hits the floor. Like we knew it would.
But wait. What's that snapping noise? Why isn't Gwen moving?
For audiences who didn't see it coming, the death of Gwen Stacy was the most shocking thing that happened by far — and in a film that introduced Electro, no less. Because the hero always saves the day, and by extension, his girlfriend, right?
Plus Emma Stone's charisma was just as key to this franchise's appeal as radioactive spiders and Andrew Garfield's hair. To kill her off was ballsy to say the least. And honestly, that's true even for fans who knew Gwen's life was fated to end this way because the filmmakers could have easily avoided that classic comic book storyline.
The Night Gwen Stacy Died, as first told in 1973's The Amazing Spider-Man #121–122, is hailed as a classic now, perhaps even the definitive Spider-Man story, although it wasn't always that way. Marvel received death threats following Gerry Conway's decision to bump Gwen off, and as a result, superhero storytelling shifted into darker territory, effectively ending the Silver Age of comics with more mature and risky subject matter than ever before.
Forty years later, Gwen's death is still controversial with some critics pointing out the unfortunate "fridging" trope it's hinged on. The idea is that comics often kill the girlfriends, wives, and even female siblings of male superheroes to advance their story, focusing on how it impacts them rather than the woman in question who died for their sake.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 could have swung around this entirely by avoiding Gwen's death to keep her alive, plus that would have been a more shocking twist for comic book fans who expected the worst. However, it could be argued that doing so would have robbed the film of its emotional impact. Actually depicting Gwen's body snap in real time was bold to say the least, and the sadness that followed was genuinely quite moving, thanks in large part to Garfield's typically great performance.
In that respect, Gwen's death expands on the idea that "With great power comes great responsibility," because it reminds us that even with such power, heroes can't save everyone. That's an important lesson to learn, especially as Uncle Ben's original line has been milked to death in other respects. Yet that tricky "fridging" trope makes it a bit harder to stomach still. Just because it's less common in superhero cinema doesn't make it any less unsettling for comic book fans who are tired of seeing women brutalised in this way.
It doesn't help that this version of the franchise stopped at this point, so we didn't even get the payoff this unfortunate "fridging" was supposed to bring.
At least some catharsis finally came seven years later when Garfield's Peter returned in 2021's Spider-Man: No Way Home. Chatting with Tobey Maguire and Tom Holland Spidey's, this Peter reveals that he's not been able to move on still and even blames himself for Gwen's death. So when Zendaya's MJ falls just like Gwen did all those years ago, Andrew's Spidey leaps into the fray and saves her, but without using his webs this time.
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No-one even alludes to Gwen directly at this point, but Peter's obviously thinking of her still as he fights back tears knowing he did right by her memory in this touching, full-circle moment. In that regard, Garfield's arc here truly is "amazing", even if the original films he starred in were not. That's something we can all agree on, no matter how divided we might be on what happened to Gwen herself in one of superhero cinema's riskiest moves yet.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2 returns to UK cinemas on Friday, 30 August.
