A Critic’s Final Word on Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark
1 / 10
Spider-Man — to beat my running metaphor into the ground and then leave it for dead — is like that good-and-crazy friend with a highly entertaining substance-abuse problem, the one who goes off and gets clean, and comes back a different and diminished person: With his manias and overmuchness reined in, you suddenly realize how very little you ever had to offer one another. With Taymor gone, and the ruins of her monstrous Lovecraftian vision overrun by Lilliputians, there's simply nothing to see here, other than the sort of 'stunt spectacular' that wouldn't look out of place amid a backdrop of roller coasters and toddler vomit. It's a vast emptiness, void even of its animating madness. It shuffles and smiles and subsides, like a good inmate, its hummingbird heartbeat slowed to a crawl. Put your head to Spidey's chest, and all you'll hear is the dull smack of a damp wad of cash hitting the boards.

