Month of May Movie Sequels You May or May Not Want to See

The three biggest releases of may promise to be a mixed bag, so it is important to consider the options before heading out the door to spend you time and money on one! Fortunately, each of these three movies (Spider Man 3, Shrek the Third and 28 Weeks Later) is intended to appeal to a different audience. So, no matter what your tastes, you should be able to find something you enjoy!

Spider Man 3: The best contemporary super-hero movies are the ones that successfully appeal to both an original fan base (from the comic books) as well as being engaging to mainstream audiences. The X-Men series is perhaps the best example of this, with its mixed and matched characters and plots that combine to create a compelling new storyline!

Spider-Man 1 started off a bit slow, simply retelling the origin story, with Peter Parker being predictably bitten by a radioactive spider and gaining his super-powers. A few twists were added to please the fans, like the inclusion of Bruce Campbell (a well known and popular b-movie star) and his quirky mis-naming of Spider Man during the wrestling scene. However, for the most part, Tobey Maguire is the only thing that carries the show - and that only by adding some physical humor to his dull script.

Spider-Man 2 at least had some more dramatic action and some build-up in the (albeit again predictable to comic fans) storyline with the Goblin, Spidey and their respective feelings for Mary Jane. However, this movie - more-so even than the first - borders on being an overly-dramatic tale of teen angst rather than a subtle character study of complex individuals in a twisted set of relationships. Spider-Man 3 has one hope for being better than the others: it may successfully stir together various plot-lines and critical characters (the Venom suite, Sandman and the Green Goblin) enough to keep things interesting for the fan base while resolving the built-up plot issues for a mainstream audience. Certainly it will be action-packed but the dialogue on the trailers so far in the trailers hows questionable depth of plot or thought. All of the that being said: any Spider-Man fan won't be able to resist, and hopefully won't be disappointed!

Shrek the Third will hopefully manage to appeal to adults as much as it is sure to appeal to kids. If you have kids, then you know: they love most movies, and once they are familiar with characters they love seeing those characters again and again. Adults, on the other hand, have more expectations. We want each movie to be at least as good as the last - the residual impact of the first isn't enough. The Meyers-and-Murphy combo can be be fairly entertaining at times, and the past scripts have done well at integrating high-level dialog layered on kid-friendly content - a tough thing to do in any movie. Still, the third movie is largely set in a static location with a plot that isn't completely clear. The primary villain seems static and possibly ill-defined. And, most troubling of all, the dialogue on the trailers has been relatively dull. So, while this might be worth bringing the family to, it probably isn't going to be as successful for childless adult audiences as the previous two movies were.

28 Weeks Later will have a difficult time living up to the ingenuity of 28 Days Later. What made the first movie so amazing was the gripping time spent between scenes of action and violence by an individual protagonist or small group of people. As they made their way through a haunted London then to the barren English countryside, these characters were developed and explored in great depth. The sequel, 28 Weeks Later, concerns another outbreak of the same Rage virus that hits an slowly-recovering planet. Essentially: it uses the same exact plot-driving device as the original, without the edge-of-your-seat emptiness that keeps you guessing in the first movie So, as a person who thought the original was brilliant, I suspect I'll wait for this one to hit DVD. Why? Well, I can't imagine it will be as suspenseful, but sure, after the original was so compelling, I definitely will at least give it a chance sooner or later.